A Russian rocket hit the regional administration of the southern Ukrainian port metropolis of Mykolaiv on Tuesday, killing at least three people and injuring 22, local authorities said. Eighteen of the injured were pulled from the wreckage by rescue workers, who continued to work at the scene, emergency services said in an online post.
An image shared by local governor Vitaly Kim confirmed a large gap in the side of the building. On Tuesday, Reuters witnesses saw the wreckage in the distance and ambulances and furnace engines heading to the scene. The neighborhood was once surrounded.
“They destroyed half the building, broke into my office,” Kim said.
Russian forces have attacked Ukraine’s southern ports, including Kherson, Odessa, Mykolaiv and Mariupol, as they seek to cut off Ukraine from the Black Sea and establish a land corridor from Russia to Crimea, the peninsula Russia seized in 2014.
Kim said the strike had an upside — it suggested Russia had given up trying to capture the city.
Russia has called its action in Ukraine a “special forces operation” to disarm its neighbor. It denied targeting civilians and did not comment further on the attack on Mykolive.
Ukraine and the West say Russian President Vladimir Putin has started an unpopular war.