Russian missiles hit near Lviv airport as strikes across Ukraine continue
CBC
The latest:
Russian forces pressed their assault on Ukrainian cities Friday, with new missile strikes and shelling on the capital Kyiv and the outskirts of the western city of Lviv, as world leaders pushed for an investigation of the Kremlin's repeated attacks on civilian targets, including schools, hospitals and residential areas.
Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovyi said on Telegram that several missiles hit a facility used to repair military aircraft and damaged a bus repair facility, though no casualties were immediately reported. The aircraft repair facility had suspended work ahead of the attack, the mayor said.
The missiles that hit Lviv were launched from the Black Sea, but two of the six that were launched were shot down, Ukrainian air force's western command said on Facebook.
Not far from the Polish border and well behind the front lines, Lviv and the surrounding area has not been spared Russia's attacks, the worst of which killed nearly three dozen people last weekend at a training facility near the city. Meanwhile, the city's population has swelled by some 200,000 as people from elsewhere in Ukraine have sought shelter there.
Smoke could be seen rising from the western part of the capital Kyiv after an early morning barrage Friday. There were no immediate reports of casualties or what had been damaged.
In city after city around Ukraine, hospitals, schools and buildings where people sought safety from the bombardment have been attacked.
Rescue workers searched for survivors in the ruins of a theatre that served as a shelter when it was blown apart by a Russian airstrike in the besieged southern city of Mariupol. And in Merefa, near the northeast city of Kharkiv, at least 21 people were killed when Russian artillery destroyed a school and a community centre, a local official said.
Ukraine's state emergency service said a multi-storey teaching building was shelled on Friday morning in the eastern city of Kharkiv, killing one person, wounding 11 and trapping one person in the rubble.
Shells also hit the eastern city of Kramatorsk on Friday, killing two people and wounding six, Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said in an online post.
Civilian casualties have been mounting. The United Nations says that so far it has recorded 780 killed and 1,252 injured, although it estimates actual casualties are much higher. It says that most of the civilian casualties were due to explosive weapons with a wide impact area, such as heavy artillery and multiple-launch rocket systems as well as missile and air strikes.
Ukrainian officials say thousands of civilians have been killed.
The World Health Organization has verified 43 attacks on hospitals and health facilities, with 12 people killed and 34 injured, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told the United Nations Security Council in a virtual briefing Thursday.
As Russian attacks continued, U.S. President Joe Biden was speaking with Chinese President Xi Jinping, in an attempt to starve Russia's war machine by isolating Moscow from the one big power that has yet to condemn its assault.
