A strike Russian conducted Tuesday on Zaporizhzhyaa large city in southern Ukraine, made eight dead and 22 injured, according to a new assessment provided Wednesday by the emergency services, while other people could be found under the rubble.
The strike, which destroyed a clinic and an office building in the city center, is the latest in a series of attacks that have intensified in southern Ukraine, reinforcing fears of a new Russian offensive in the region.
“The body of another deceased person was pulled from the rubble” bringing the death toll in the attack to eight, Ukraine's State Emergency Service (DSNS) said on Telegram.
Twenty-two people were also injured, including a child, added the same source. It is a five-year-old girl, the Ministry of the Interior indicated earlier in the morning that “Up to five people could be trapped under the rubble.”
Tuesday evening, the DSNS indicated that it was able “save two women” who had passed “more than seven hours under the rubble” by temperatures close to zero. The survivors telephoned the DSNS and explained where they were precisely, thus allowing rescue operations to be accelerated, according to the same source.
The governor of the Zaporizhia region, Ivan Fedorov, indicated for his part that “20 residential buildings and three non-residential buildings were damaged.”
More than 160 rescuers are working on site to clear the rubble, added Mr. Fedorov. He accompanied his message with a photograph showing mechanical excavators and firefighters working near ruined buildings.
Zaporizhia is one of four Ukrainian regions that Moscow has claimed to annex in 2022, without fully controlling it.
Ukrainian experts and soldiers believe that the Russian army could prepare a new ground offensive on the Southern front, where positions have remained generally unchanged for months.
Such an attack would constitute a challenge for the Ukrainian army, already struggling on the Eastern Front and which is engaged in the Russian border region of Kursk, of which it occupies a small part.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who condemned “a brutal attack” on Tuesday, urged the West to provide more air defense systems to Ukraine, including American Patriot batteries.
“Ten to twelve additional Patriot systems” will allow Ukraine to “completely protect your sky”, he said. A Russian attack had already left 10 dead in Zaporizhia last Friday.
