Authorities say several people have been killed and others injured in a new Russian attack with cruise missiles on the Ukrainian port city of Odessa on the Black Sea. A Kalibr projectile struck a storage building and started a fire there, the high command of the Ukrainian Army Group South wrote on Facebook on Wednesday. Three camp workers were killed and seven injured.
People could still be lying under the rubble of the camp. Odessa, which has again been shelled by a Russian warship from the Black Sea, has repeatedly been the target of Russian attacks. Also on Saturday there were dead in a fire and more than two dozen injured.
A total of four Kalibr cruise missiles were shot down, the high command in Odessa said. As a result of a dogfight and a blast wave, a business center, an education building, a residential complex, a diner and shops in the city center were damaged. According to the first findings, six were injured, it said.
Previously, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had called for stronger air defenses for Ukraine and tougher sanctions against Russia after the deadly Russian missile attack on his hometown of Kryvyi Rih. “Together with our partners, we must create such conditions that Russian terrorism becomes impossible,” he said Tuesday evening in his daily video address.
Firstly, the purchase of even more air defense systems and fighter jets would be necessary, secondly, the sanctions against Russia would have to be enforced more consistently. “If we take, for example, one of the rockets that hit Kryvyi Rih today, then about 50 components in it – mainly microelectronics – were made in other countries,” Zelenskyy said. Some of them are even produced in Ukraine’s partner countries, and yet Russia manages to get hold of the components. The companies that work with Moscow are known.
“If someone acts as an intermediary or works with Russia to allow terrorists to continue blowing up houses and killing people, then such actors – corporate or state – deserve an appropriate response from the world,” Zelenskyy said. In any case, it would be cheaper to enforce the sanctions than to constantly deliver new missile defense systems, he warned the West.
Zelenskyj also went into a meeting with the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, in Kiev. He thanked the observer mission at the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, which was occupied by Russians, but once again called for it to be handed over to Ukraine to ensure security. He accepted an observer mission offered by Grossi to assess the consequences of the destruction of the Kachowka dam. He hopes that the experts will leave for the crisis area as soon as possible, said the 45-year-old.
He only touched on the events of the war in passing, but spoke of progress in different directions. In the past few days, Ukraine had reported the liberation of several towns as part of its offensive. According to experts, however, the offensive is difficult to get going and has not yet achieved a deep front breakthrough.