Kharkiv: Russian attack kills 18 people in megastore, deadliest attack in Ukraine in weeks

CNN
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Regional authorities said 18 people, including a 12-year-old girl, were among those killed in a Russian attack on a large department store in Kharkiv over the weekend, making it the deadliest attack Ukraine has suffered in several weeks.

Five people are still missing, Oleh Syniehubov, head of the Kharkiv region military administration, said on Monday. He said 48 people were injured in the attack on the Epicenter shopping center building, while nearly 200 people were inside the building.

Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city near the border with Russia, has been the scene of a series of Russian attacks in recent weeks.

The surveillance camera footage from the moment of impact shows how the building shook on impact and the entire area was immediately enveloped in thick smoke and flames. Police and witnesses reported at least two explosions.

Oleksandr Lutsenko, director of the Epicenter shopping center, said he was in his office on the second floor at the time of the two explosions.

“I made my way down the corridor to the evacuation exit, but it was dark and the whole corridor was covered with dust. There was no air to breathe,” he told CNN by phone.

“The employees also left. Everyone was groping and holding each other. We could hear the ceiling collapsing.”

When he was outside, he saw that the hypermarket was on fire. “There was black smoke everywhere and it was hard to breathe. Some people jumped out of the windows,” Lutsenko added.

Ukrainian Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko described the hours after the attack as “hellish” and thanked everyone who helped put out the fires. Photos from inside the store after the attack show the building completely destroyed, with burned goods and collapsed walls.

The Ukrainian Catholic University identified the 12-year-old girl killed as Maria Myronenko and said in a Facebook post that she was killed in the attack along with her mother Iryna, who was studying at the university. Her father was also injured and is being treated in hospital, it said.

Serhii Bolvinov, head of the investigative department of the Kharkiv regional police, said the family had been shopping when the two bombs struck. Maria’s older sister Nadiya, 20, was not with them at the time and only learned of the deaths when she found her father in hospital.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky condemned the attack as a “brutal attack” and said: “Russia is ruled by men who want to make this the norm – they burn lives, destroy cities and villages, divide people and destroy national borders through war.”

Zelensky, who was in Spain on an official visit on Monday, called on Ukraine’s allies to equip the country with more air defenses.

At a meeting with Zelensky in Madrid on Monday, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced a new arms deal with Ukraine worth $1.08 billion. The aim of the deal is to “strengthen air defense systems” and protect the Ukrainian population and infrastructure from Russian attacks.

“We are sending Patriot missiles,” Sanchez said of the US-built air defense system. “Zelensky is asking for the platforms to launch them and is asking how many we can supply. We are sending another batch of Leopard tanks and, most importantly, ammunition that the (Ukrainian) troops need.”

Zelensky was due to visit Spain earlier this month, but postponed his trip due to the Russian offensive around Kharkiv and other parts of Ukraine. That offensive appears to be ongoing, and Kharkiv is under heavy attack on a daily basis.

According to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, the United States announced on Friday that it would provide Ukraine with $275 million in military aid as part of “efforts to help Ukraine repel the Russian attack near Kharkiv.”

The senior US diplomat said the new tranche of aid included “much-needed capabilities” for Ukrainian troops battling to halt Russia’s advance toward the key city in the country’s northeast.

News of the new military aid came after Ukraine’s Defense Ministry dampened expectations that French military trainers could soon arrive in Ukraine. Online comments by Army Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi seemed to suggest that their arrival in the country was a done deal.

“I welcome France’s initiative to send instructors to Ukraine to train Ukrainian military personnel,” Syrskyi wrote on Telegram after a video conference between him and the defense ministers of the two countries. “I have already signed the documents that will allow the first French instructors to visit our training centers and familiarize themselves with the infrastructure and personnel.”

Syrskyi’s statement did not contain a possible timetable, but suggested that France would be ready for a significant shift in NATO participation in the war between Ukraine and Russia.

To reinforce this sentiment, Syrskyi further wrote: “I believe that France’s determination will encourage other partners to join this ambitious project. I thanked the Minister for the friendly support of the French people and the military and economic assistance to Ukraine in repelling Russian military aggression.”

In a later comment to CNN that appeared to be aimed at tempering expectations and potentially appeasing key allies, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry adopted a more measured tone, saying Kyiv had “expressed interest in hosting foreign trainers in Ukraine” since a conference in Paris in late February.

“We are in ongoing discussions with France and other countries on this issue and have started internal documentation to be able to proceed once the decision is taken,” the brief statement concluded.

The French Defense Ministry issued a similar message on the subject of military trainers in a comment to CNN.

“As with all projects discussed at the conference, we continue to work with Ukrainians to understand their precise needs,” the statement said.

French President Emmanuel Macron had raised the idea at the Paris conference that sending military trainers to Ukraine was an opportunity for Kyiv’s Western allies to station troops in the country.

Additional reporting by Victoria Butenko and Daria Tarasova Markina in Kyiv and Xiaofei Xu in Paris