A missile attack on a shopping center and a warehouse of goods caused at least one dead and five injured in the city of Odessa, in southern Ukraine, the Ukrainian army advanced this Tuesday.
The Southern Operational Command of the Ukrainian armed forces said, throughout Monday and overnight, Russian troops fired at least seven missiles at Odessa from the Crimean peninsula, controlled by Russia since 2014.
One of the missiles “managed to penetrate a shopping center and a warehouse of consumer products”, said the Ukrainian army, in a publication on the social network Facebook.
“The enemy continues to attack civilians and civilian infrastructure” in the port city by the Black Sea, using “obsolete” munitions, which date back to the era of the Soviet Union, according to the publication.
Spokesperson for the Headquarters of Operations of the Odessa Regional Military Administration, Sergei Bratchuk, said that “already at night”, Russian troops attacked the region again.
“The enemy continues to launch missiles at the city and region, trying to destroy the infrastructure. We thank the air defense forces for their combat work,” Bratchuk said on the Telegram platform.
Before the attack on the shopping center and warehouse, the Odessa municipality said, also on Telegram, that the region had been hit by at least four Onix missiles, one of the most modern high-precision projectiles in the Russian armed forces’ arsenal.
At least two wounded were taken to hospital and five tourist buildings were destroyed.
On Monday, the UK Ministry of Defense said, in its traditional daily report on the Russian offensive in Ukraine, that Russia is being forced to use older, less accurate and more easily intercepted weapons.
Hours later, Russia denied that it lacked precision-guided missiles.
“If you believed everything they say on the other side, Russia should have run out of missiles in March. For some reason, that didn’t happen. Defense companies are supplying our army with the necessary number of missiles,” he said. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov speaking to Interfax.
Borisov assured that “there are enough precision guided missiles and modern munitions to fulfill all the missions established for the Russian Armed Forces”.
Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24 and the military offensive has already killed more than 3,000 civilians, according to the UN, which warns that the real number is likely to be much higher.
The military offensive caused the flight of more than 13 million people, of which more than 5.5 million were out of the country, according to the latest UN data.
The Russian invasion was condemned by the international community in general, which responded by sending weapons to Ukraine and reinforcing economic and political sanctions on Moscow.
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