KIEV, Ukraine (AP) — President Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned Sunday that Russia was preparing to step up an offensive along Ukraine’s northern border after the death toll from an airstrike on a large construction supplies store in the city of Kharkiv rose to 14.
The bombing of Kharkiv on Saturday afternoon left 43 people wounded and 16 missing, Kharkiv Oblast Governor Oleh Shniekhbov said shortly after the attack.
Zelenskiy said in a video statement from Kharkiv that Russia was preparing offensive action 90 kilometers (55 miles) northwest of Ukraine’s second-largest city. He said Russia was “assembling new forces near our border.”
KHARKIV, UKRAINE – May 26, 2024: In Kharkiv, Ukraine, a local woman visited the National Emergency Services headquarters at the site of a missile attack to provide a DNA sample for the identification of her dead relatives. Russia launched a missile attack on the construction hypermarket Epicentre during daylight hours on a weekday. 200 people were inside the store at the time of the attack. As of May 26, 14 people are confirmed dead and 15 are missing. National Emergency Services are working to put out the fire and search for customers who died in the supermarket. (Photo by Kostyantin Liberov/Ribkos/Getty Images)
He did not say where the troops were massing, but Ukrainian authorities have expressed strong concerns about the Sumy region, where Kharkiv and its neighbors – home to about 250,000 people – lie within about 25 kilometers (15 miles) of the Russian border.
Moscow’s forces have seized villages in the Kharkiv region in recent weeks as part of a broader offensive that analysts say may be aimed at bringing the city within artillery range. Ukrainian authorities have evacuated more than 11,000 people from the area since the offensive began on May 10.
Russian forces are pushing forward on a 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front, with heavy fighting brewing in the area of Chashiv Yar in Donetsk Oblast, where a “significant increase in the intensity of hostilities” has occurred, according to a statement from the Ukrainian General Staff. “The Armed Forces are taking measures to halt the enemy’s advance,” it said.
Moscow boasts that the West lacks the weapons to reverse Ukraine’s war, while Kiev claims Russia has suffered 500,000 casualties https://t.co/gkSFDjy9Km
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) May 25, 2024
Russia launched a widespread missile and drone attack overnight across much of Ukraine. Ukrainian officials said their air defenses intercepted 31 Shahed drones and 12 cruise missiles fired by Russia in the Mykolaiv, Odesa, Dnipropetrovsk, Poltava, Zaporizhia, Khmelnytskyi, Kirovohrad, Vinnytsia and Chernihiv regions.
According to a statement from the Ukrainian Air Force, Russia fired a total of 14 missiles and more than 30 drones. It is unclear what damage was caused by the missiles and drones that were not shot down.
The governor of Russia’s Belgorod region, which borders Ukraine, said four people were wounded in an overnight Ukrainian military attack. The Russian Defense Ministry said seven drones were shot down over the Kursk region north of Belgorod and three over Oryol.
NATO Secretary General: Ukraine should be allowed to use Western missiles against Russian soilhttps://t.co/fQgPmuLhzR
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) May 25, 2024
