Death toll rises in Russian strike on crowded DIY store in Ukraine’s Kharkiv
Two guided bombs hit the Epicentr DIY hypermarket in a residential area of the city on Saturday afternoon, Regional Governor Oleh Syniehubov said on national television, AFP reports.
The strikes caused a massive fire which sent a column of thick, black smoke billowing hundreds of metres into the air.
Forty-three people were injured, the local prosecutors' office said, adding that ten of the twelve dead had still not been identified.
Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov said about 120 people had been in the hardware store when the bombs struck.
"The attack targeted the shopping centre, where there were many people - this is clearly terrorism," Terekhov said.
In a post on the Telegram app, Ukraine’s Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said 16 people were still missing after the strike.
The past week has seen an uptick in strikes on the city after Russian troops stormed across the border, opening a new front north of the city.
Russia has bombarded Kharkiv, which lies less than 30 kilometres (20 miles) from its border, throughout the war, having reached its outskirts in a failed bid to capture it in 2022.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy issued a plea to Ukraine's Western allies to help boost air defences to keep the country's cities safe. French President Emmanuel Macron, writing on social media platform X, denounced the attack on the store as "unacceptable."
