Ukraine and Russia traded new lethal attacks Sunday as their war neared the 28-month mark.
Five people, including two children, were killed by falling debris and another 124 were wounded when Russian forces shot down five Ukrainian missiles in Sevastopol, a Black Sea port city in Russian-occupied Crimea, officials said.
In a separate attack, one person was killed and three injured in Russia’s Belgorod region, bordering Ukraine, when three Ukrainian drones hit the city of Grayvoron.
Sevastopol Governor Mikhail Razvozhayev said the attack there hit Uchkuyevka, an area with sandy beaches and hotels. A local news channel on Telegram, ChP Sevastopol, reported that witnesses said an elderly woman was killed as she swam in the sea.
Fragments hit beachgoers after at least one missile was intercepted by air defenses and exploded in the air, according to officials.
Sevastopol is a naval base on the Crimean Peninsula annexed by Russia in 2014. It has regularly come under fire from Ukraine, but Sunday’s attack was unusually deadly.
Russia’s defense ministry said Ukraine used U.S.-supplied weapons in the attack and accused it of using cluster munitions.
The attack on Sevastopol came a day after a Russian guided bomb struck an apartment building in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, killing two people and injuring more than 50.
On Sunday, another Russian strike hit a house in the city, killing one and injuring five, regional Governor Oleh Syniehubov said. Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov said three people were wounded by a separate strike on a children’s educational facility.
In a video address following the Saturday attack on Kharkiv, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged Ukraine’s Western partners to bolster its air defenses.
“Modern air defense systems for Ukraine — such as Patriots, accelerated training of our pilots for F-16s, and most importantly, sufficient range for our weapons — are truly necessary,” he said.
Some material in this report came from Agence France-Presse and The Associated Press.
