The latest update on the fallout from the attack was provided by Ukraine’s state emergency services on Wednesday morning, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
Russia on Tuesday night struck Kramatorsk, in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, with two S-300 missiles which hit a restaurant in the city centre, The Kyiv Independent website reported.
Eight killed, 56 injured
Eight people were killed, including two children aged 15 and one aged 12, according to the PAP news agency.
A further 56 people, including an eight-month-old child, suffered injuries, officials said.
Three people have been rescued so far and emergency services continued to search for people still believed to be trapped under the debris, The Kyiv Independent reported.
At least three foreigners among wounded
The restaurant is popular with locals and foreign correspondents covering the war against the Russian invasion, and at least three foreigners are among the wounded, according to news outlets.
Regional governor Pavlo Kyrylenko provided more details in a post on the Telegram social messaging app on Wednesday morning.
He said: “The Russians struck with two missiles - one aimed at a private enterprise, the second at a pizzeria. The impact completely destroyed the building of the pizzeria, damaged 18 high-rise buildings, 65 private houses, five schools, two kindergartens, a shopping centre, a hotel, an administrative building and a recreational facility.”
“The final figures for victims and destruction may still change,” Kyrylenko added, as quoted by Britain’s The Guardian newspaper.
Russian shelling injures three in Ukraine’s Kherson province
Meanwhile, Russia also shelled Ukraine’s southern Kherson region overnight, striking 12 times with a total of 49 shells and injuring three people, Ukraine’s state broadcaster Suspilne reported, as quoted by The Guardian.
On the night of June 27-28, Ukraine’s air defence took down six Shahed” drones, including two over the central Cherkasy region, but two more UAVs hit an empty warehouse in the province, according to officials.
‘Main event’ in Ukraine’s counteroffensive ‘yet to come’: defence minister
Ukraine’s Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov has said that “the main event” in his country’s summer counteroffensive against Russia is "yet to come."
Reznikov told the UK’s Financial Times newspaper that the liberation of a group of villages from Russian occupation in recent weeks represented “not the main event,” but a “preview” of a much bigger push by Ukrainian forces in the future.
'When it happens, you will all see it'
The Ukrainian defence minister vowed: “When it happens, you will all see it … Everyone will see everything.”
Reznikov said in the interview that his country’s main troop reserves, including brigades recently trained in the West and equipped with modern NATO tanks and armoured vehicles, had yet to be deployed in the summer counteroffensive, the FT reported.
Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, launching the largest military campaign in Europe since World War II.
Wednesday is day 490 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
(pm/gs)
Source: PAP, The Kyiv Independent, BBC, The Guardian, Financial Times
