On Friday, Russia launched strikes against Ukraine, killing at least eight people, including two children, while Kyiv claimed it shot down a Russian strategic bomber for the first time.
Moscow says a military plane crashed on Russian territory while returning from a combat mission due to a technical problem.
The downing of a Russian bomber capable of firing cruise missiles would be a significant symbolic victory for Ukraine, which has been bombarded by hundreds of Russian air raids since Moscow invaded more than two years ago.
Officials say the latest Russian strikes on the eastern Dnipropetrovsk region resulted in more deaths and destruction.
“Russia launched a devastating air strike on the Dnipropetrovsk region this morning. Two children were among those deceased. “A 14-year-old girl and an 8-year-old boy,” Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
Sergiy Lysak, the region’s leader, claimed physicians were able to save a six-year-old kid who had previously been reported dead, bringing the total number of deaths down from nine. Twelve people were reportedly hurt.
Life-saving air defence
The strikes, which targeted the region’s Synelnykivsky district and the regional seat of Dnipro, sparked renewed indignation in Kyiv.
“Children should not be killed in air strikes in modern Europe. “We must provide them with a reliable air shield,” Kuleba stated.
According to Ukraine’s railway operator, the attack damaged train facilities and injured seven staff. A female employee was slain, they added.
In response to the strike, President Volodymyr Zelensky reiterated requests for Ukraine’s Western allies to supply stronger air defense systems.
“Every country that provides air defence systems to Ukraine, every leader who helps persuade our partners that air defence systems should not be stored in warehouses but deployed in real cities and communities facing terror, and everyone who supports our defence is a life saver,” Zelensky stated in a press release.
Zelensky visited troops and examined defenses in the eastern Donetsk region, he said. Russian soldiers have taken advantage of Ukraine’s manpower and ammunition limitations to progressively gain ground in the area.
In Washington, the US House of Representatives is preparing for a critical weekend vote on a long-stalled $61 billion military aid package that may provide much-needed weapons to Ukrainian soldiers on the front lines.
Ukraine said it has shot down a Russian long-range strategic bomber on a combat mission for the first time.
Ukraine’s defense ministry’s principal intelligence directorate reported that the Tu-22M3 was returning to its Russian base after firing missiles against Ukraine earlier that night.
Shot down
Russian officials said that the plane crashed over the southern Stavropol region. They reported that the pilots ejected, but at least one member of the crew died.
“According to preliminary data, the cause of the accident was a technical malfunction,” the defense ministry told state media.
Stavropol Governor Vladimir Vladimirov stated that two crew members had been sent to a local medical facility.
“The search for the fourth pilot continues,” he said, tweeting photographs of the burned-out and twisted jet fuselage in a field.
According to the governor, the jet crashed in the region’s Krasnogvardeysky district, some 400 kilometers (250 miles) from the eastern frontier of the seized Crimean peninsula.
According to the Ukraine intelligence directorate, the plane “was shot down at a distance of approximately 300 kilometers from Ukraine.” As a result of the hit, the bomber was able to fly to Stavropol, where it crashed.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched 22 missiles and 14 Iranian-designed attack drones overnight, including from the crashed strategic bomber.
It stated that all unmanned aerial vehicles and 15 missiles had been downed.
Russian airstrikes have pounded towns and cities across Ukraine since Moscow’s invasion more than two years ago. A missile attack on the northern city of Chernigiv killed 18 people earlier this week.