Russian strikes on eastern Ukraine city kill two, wound 19

Russia on Wednesday struck the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk with guided bombs, killing at least two people and wounding 19, regional governor Vadym Filashkin said.

The Donetsk region governor said in a video post from the scene there were fears that the toll could grow.

Rescue workers searched through the ruined buildings and there “may still be dead and wounded under the rubble”, the governor said on Telegram.

The strikes were provisionally carried out by “two guided aerial bombs”, Filashkin said.

“The Russians hit the city centre. Two high-rise buildings, shops and cars were damaged.”

AFP journalists at the scene saw what appeared to be two separate hits around a kilometre (0.6 miles) apart, both in residential areas.

Thick plumes of smoke billowed over a partially destroyed 10-storey brick block of flats.

Resident Tatyana Rybakova stood nearby, pointing at the place where her flat used to be on the eighth floor, now a gaping hole.

She said she had “crawled away from the window” after a loud bang, and was struggling to come to her senses.

“I understand I have been left without a home: that I do understand,” she added.

The strike also destroyed a five-storey apartment block and nearby restaurants.

Rescuers led an elderly woman, her face bloodied, out of the destroyed block of flats, asking her if she had relatives nearby.

A neighbour, Lyudmyla Shalayeva, said she was cleaning her flat when she saw an explosion and barely had time to shelter in her hall.

“We’re scared every day,” she said.

“But we didn’t expect any shelling right here at us… Who can expect that?”

Kramatorsk lies around 20 kilometres (13 miles) from the front line, with fears over its fate rising as Russian forces continue their push into eastern Ukraine.

A safety advisor working for Reuters news agency was killed in a missile strike on a hotel in Kramatorsk last month.

In June last year, a Russian ballistic missile tore through the city’s popular Ria Pizza restaurant, killing 13 people and wounding dozens.

A Russian strike on the city’s train station in April 2022 killed more than 60 civilians, including children, and wounded more than 160 fleeing the Russian advance.