Russian Strikes Kill 3 in Ukraine’s Second City Kharkiv

Firefighters remove debris after a military strike hit a building in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on July 11, 2022. Nacho Doce/Reuters

CHASIV YAR, Ukraine/KYIV—Russian weapons pounding Ukraine’s second largest city Kharkiv killed at least three people on Monday, authorities said, while rescuers pulled survivors from the rubble of an earlier strike on an apartment block that killed 19 people in another city.

The artillery, multiple rocket launcher, and tank attack on Kharkiv also injured 31 people, regional governor Oleh Synehubov said.

In the city of Chasiv Yar, further south, rescuers made voice contact with two people in the wreckage of the five-storey apartment building hit by a rocket on Saturday, and emergency services released video of workers pulling a man from under the concrete debris, where up to two dozen people were trapped.

The attack on Chasiv Yar was part of Russia’s push to capture all of the industrial Donbass region in the east, partly controlled by separatist proxies since 2014, after declaring victory in Luhansk Province earlier this month.

Kharkiv, in the northeast close to the Russian border but outside the Donbass, suffered heavy bombardment in the first few months of the war followed by a period of relative calm that has been shattered by renewed shelling in recent weeks.

The city’s mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said civilian infrastructure had been hit by the latest strikes, including a commercial property and a tyre repair shop.

Moscow denies targeting civilians.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia had carried out 34 air strikes since Saturday.

Rescuers extract a body from a residential building damaged by a Russian military strike in the town of Chasiv Yar, in Donetsk region, Ukraine, on July 10, 2022. Gleb Garanich/Reuters

Diplomatic Faultlines

The war has exposed diplomatic faultlines across Europe and sent energy and food prices soaring. Applying a further phase of European Union sanctions against Russia, Lithuania on Monday expanded restrictions on trade through its territory to Russia’s Baltic coast exclave of Kaliningrad.

Europe’s dependence on Russian energy was preoccupying policymakers and the business world as the biggest pipeline carrying Russian gas to Germany began 10 days of annual maintenance. Governments, markets, and companies are worried the shutdown might be extended because of the war.

Wave of Strikes

After taking Luhansk, Russian forces are now concentrating on seizing control of neighboring Donetsk Province.

Service members of pro-Russian troops stand next to a howitzer during an exhibition of Ukrainian army hardware and weapons left in the city after its withdrawal during the Ukraine-Russia conflict, in Lysychansk, Luhansk Region, Ukraine, on July 8, 2022. Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters

Ukraine’s general staff said on Monday that Russia had launched a wave of bombardments as they seek to take Donetsk, the other province in the Donbass.

It said the widespread shelling amounted to preparations for an intensification of hostilities.

The U.S.–based Institute for the Study of War said Russian troops were regrouping and that the heavy artillery fire was intended to set conditions for future ground advances by identifying Ukrainian weaknesses.

Russia’s defense ministry said its missiles struck ammunition depots in Ukraine’s central Dnipro region used to supply rocket launchers and artillery weapons.

Reuters was unable to independently verify the battlefield reports.

Ukraine is preparing a counter-attack in the south of the country where Russia seized territory early in the war.

Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk warned civilians in the Russian-controlled Kherson region in the south on Sunday to urgently evacuate ahead of the offensive. She gave no timeframe for action.

Ukrainian forces recaptured the village of Ivanivka in the Kherson region, a Ukrainian infantry brigade claimed on Monday.

By Anna Voitenko and Tom Balmforth