Kyiv, Ukraine
Reuters
Nine people were killed in Russian attacks across Ukraine on Tuesday, including a drone strike that set ablaze industrial warehouses and destroyed humanitarian aid supplies in the western city of Lviv, officials said.
Six of the victims were killed by a guided bomb that hit the northeastern town of Kupiansk, Regional Governor Oleh Synehubov said, describing the attack as a “military crime against the civilian population of the Kharkiv region”.
Firefighters work at a site of an industrial warehouse damaged by a Russian drone strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Lviv, Ukraine on 19th September, 2023. PICTURE: Press service of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine in Lviv region/Handout via Reuters
EVIDENCE SUGGESTS ERRANT UKRAINIAN MISSILE CAUSED MARKET DEATHS – NEW YORK TIMES
Evidence suggests a deadly explosion at a busy market in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kostiantynivka this month was caused by an errant missile fired by Ukraine, the New York Times reported on Tuesday.
Ukraine has said the 6th September blast, which killed at least 16 people, was caused by a Russian missile.
“Evidence collected and analyzed by The New York Times, including missile fragments, satellite imagery, witness accounts and social media posts, strongly suggests the catastrophic strike was the result of an errant Ukrainian air defense missile fired by a Buk launch system,” the newspaper reported.
It quoted air defence experts as saying missiles such as the one that hit Kostiantynivka can go off course for a variety of reasons, including an electronic malfunction or having a guidance fin that is damaged or sheared off during launch.
It said security camera footage showed the missile flew into Kostiantynivka from the direction of Ukrainian-held territory, not from behind Russian lines.
The New York Times also cited evidence showing that minutes before the strike, the Ukrainian military had launched two surface-to-air missiles towards the Russian front line from the town of Druzhkivka, 16 kilometres north-west of Kostiantynivka.
It quoted two witnesses who said they had seen the missiles being fired from Druzhkivka in the direction of the Russian front line around the time of the strike. One was quoted as saying the missiles went in the direction of Kostiantynivka.
The newspaper said measurements of holes caused by the explosion and fragments found at the scene were consistent with the 9M38 missile, which is fired by the mobile Buk anti-aircraft vehicle. The Buk system is used both by Ukraine and Russia.
Reuters could not independently verify the report. A Ukrainian presidential aide did not immediately respond to requests by Reuters for comment.
The New York Times quoted a spokesperson for Ukraine’s armed forces as saying the country’s security service was investigating the incident, and under national law could not comment further.
A spokesperson for Ukraine’s military command referred Reuters to that comment cited in the New York Times story.
– ANNA PRUCHNICKA/Reuters
One man was killed in the drone strike on Lviv and two people, including a policeman, were killed in shelling of the southern city of Kherson, local officials said.
The attacks were the latest of many carried out by Russia since it sent troops into Ukraine nearly 19 months ago in an invasion condemned at the UN General Assembly on Tuesday by US President Joe Biden and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
The civilian death toll is rising rapidly although Moscow denies deliberately targeting civilians.
In Lviv, which is far from front lines, a huge fire broke out after three industrial warehouses were hit in an attack at around 5am, emergency services said.
Photos released by the State Emergency Service of Ukraine showed fire fighters tackling huge flames that lit up the sky above the burning warehouses.
Lviv mayor Andriy Sadovyi said the body of a man who worked at one of the warehouses had been found under the rubble, and that fire was extinguished in the late afternoon, hours after it started.
Denise Brown, the United Nations humanitarian coordinator for Ukraine, said a warehouse used by the non-governmental organisation Caritas-Spes had been destroyed.
“The vital humanitarian facility, which contained approximately 300 tons of relief supplies, was burned to the ground,” she said in a statement.
“Nexus of horror”
Lviv Regional Governor Maksym Kozytskyi said Russian forces had launched 18 drones in the attack on his region, and that 15 had been shot down, including seven that were directly over the Lviv region.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia had launched a total of 30 drones and one Iskander ballistic missile in attacks on Ukraine overnight, and that 27 of the drones had been shot down.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports. There was no immediate comment from Moscow.
Russia staged multiple air strikes on Ukrainian energy facilities last winter and has intensified attacks on port and grain infrastructure in the two months since Moscow quit a deal allowing safe exports of Ukrainian grain from Black Sea ports.
In New York, Biden said Russia’s invasion and occupation of territory violated the founding UN Charter and Guterres said the invasion had unleashed “a nexus of horror.”
