Bulent Klic/AFP through Getty Photographs
Thick black smoke was seen billowing over the once-picturesque port of Odessa, Ukraine, on Sunday morning after Russian strikes obliterated a gasoline depot within the metropolis that has to this point seen little preventing because the Russian invasion on Feb. 24. Each Russian and Ukrainian navy confirmed the hit on their Telegram channels.
“This morning, high-precision sea and air-based missiles destroyed an oil refinery and three storage services for gasoline and lubricants close to town of Odessa, from which gasoline was provided to the group of Ukrainian troops within the Mykolaiv path,” the Russian navy mentioned in an announcement on Telegram.
Odessa mayor Hennadii Trukhanov confirmed the hit and mentioned nobody had died. “As we speak the occupiers struck Odessa’s essential infrastructure objects with missiles,” he mentioned on a televised assertion that ran on Ukrainian media channels, in response to CNN. “There’s hearth, there’s smoke. Fortunately, there are not any casualties. Solely buildings are broken. The state of affairs is underneath management.”
Zohra Bensemra/Reuters
As Russian troops proceed to retreat, regroup and restock, they've left a horrific path of macabre human carnage of their wake. Ukraine’s protection ministry tweeted horrific photographs exhibiting useless bare ladies, a few of whom had been burned, alongside a highway outdoors of Kyiv the place Russian troops had been stationed. Mass graves and corpses with gunshot wounds shot at level clean vary had been additionally left behind.
The battle, now getting into its second month, exhibits no signal ending quickly, partly because of Ukraine’s fierce resistance, backed by Western donations of cash, battle equipment, and ammunition. On Sunday, the U.Ok. Protection ministry applauded Ukrainian efforts, saying they'd drastically hindered Russian air functionality. “Russia’s incapability to seek out and destroy air defence programs has significantly hampered their efforts to realize broad management of the air, which in flip has considerably affected their capacity to assist the advance of their floor forces on quite a lot of fronts,” they tweeted.
Nonetheless, nobody has claimed accountability for a strike on a gasoline depot in Belogrod, on Russian territory, after Russian navy blamed Ukraine for what can be the primary cross-border offensive if confirmed.