SEVEN people, including three children, have been killed after Russia launched fresh attacks in Ukraine just a day after Putin’s missile blitz left another 51 dead.
The drone and missile strike in the western town of Lviv – just 30 miles from the border with Nato member Poland – also saw 30 people injured.
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Wednesday’s attacks came a day after the war’s deadliest single attack this year, when Russia hit a military institute in the central town of Poltava with two ballistic missiles, killing 51 and injuring some 271 people.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on allies to help with air defences and advocate to allow long-range strikes into Russia on Wednesday, following Moscow’s deadly attack on Lviv.
He said: “Everyone who persuades partners to give Ukraine more long-range capability to respond to terror fairly is working to prevent exactly these kinds of Russian terrorist strikes on Ukrainian cities.”
Andriy Sadovyi, the mayor of Lviv city, which is the administrative centre of the wider Lviv region, said the dead included a midwife nurse and a man, while 35 people were receiving medical aid.
Early details showed that among those killed was also a 14-year-old girl, regional governor, Maksym Kozytskyi, said on the Telegram messaging app.
In a video posted on Telegram that showed the mayor among the debris of a destroyed building, he said more than 50 structures, from schools to homes and clinics, most of them in the heart of the city, had been damaged.
Neighbouring Poland scrambled aircraft on Wednesday for the third time in eight days to maintain the safety of its airspace, the armed forces’ operational command said.
“This is another very busy night for the entire air defence system in Poland due to … the long-range aviation of the Russian Federation carrying out strikes,” the command said on X.
On Wednesday, Russia also hit Kyiv and several other regions with missiles, but no immediate damage was reported.
Russia has been pounding Ukraine with hundreds of missiles and drones in the past 10 days, in what some Russian military bloggers call Moscow’s response to Kyiv’s recent incursion in its territory.
In Poltava, Russian Islander missiles scored a direct hit on a parade ground and canteen as electronic warfare trainees gathered in Poltava in northeastern Ukraine.
Dozens of military recruits scrambled for cover after being alerted by sirens but were blown up in the blast before they could reach for safety.
The attack was aimed at cadets from specialist military unit A3990 at the Institute of Communications but also damaged a nearby hospital.
Many people are now trapped under the rubble after buildings collapsed in the horror strike.
Russia has yet to comment on the attacks on Poltava and Wednesday’s strikes on Lviv and Kyiv.
Moscow has often said its strikes target Ukraine’s military, energy and transport infrastructure, not civilians.
Earlier this year, Russia struck an airfield in Poltava claiming to have destroyed Ukrainian jets, but Tuesday’s attack was more direct and targeted city areas with civilian infrastructure.
In July, Russia sparked a “genocidal massacre” after blitzing a children’s cancer hospital in Kyiv.
The missile strikes rocked Ukraine and killed at least 41 innocent civilians, including children, women and doctors.
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