World News
KIEV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian attacks left greater than 100,000 households in northern Ukraine without electricity and a regional capital cut off from water supplies on Sunday night, Ukrainian authorities reported Saturday. The variety of civilian casualties rose sharply within the embattled east of the country.
The northern region of Sumy, which borders Russia, was plunged into darkness after Russian attacks damaged energy infrastructure late Friday, Ukraine's Energy Ministry said. Hours later, Ukrainian public broadcaster reported that Russian drones had attacked the provincial capital of Sumy, cutting off water supplies by hitting power lines that feed the pumping system.
Russian state agency RIA quoted a neighborhood pro-Kremlin “underground” leader as saying Moscow's forces overnight attacked a factory producing missile ammunition in the town, which had a population of over 256,000 before the war. The report didn’t specify which weapon was used and the claim couldn’t be independently verified. Explosions in the town occurred during an air raid alert early Saturday morning, in accordance with Ukrainian media reports.
In the eastern Donetsk region, Russian artillery shelling killed 11 civilians and wounded 43 on Friday and overnight, the region's governor, Vadym Filashkin, reported on Saturday. Five people died within the town of Selydove, southeast of Pokrovsk, the eastern city that has turn out to be a flashpoint on the front lines. Ukraine's General Staff said on Saturday morning that Ukrainian and Russian forces had clashed 45 times near Pokrovsk the day prior to this.
According to Filashkin, three other people died in Chasiv Yar, the strategically situated town in Donetsk that was reduced to rubble by a months-long Russian attack.
A Ukrainian military spokesman on Thursday to the AP that Ukrainian troops had withdrawn from a neighborhood on the outskirts of Khasiv Yar. The town's elevated position gives it strategic importance, and military analysts say its fall would endanger nearby cities. It could also threaten key Ukrainian supply routes and produce Russia closer to its stated goal of taking your complete Donetsk region.
According to the Ukrainian General Staff, Russian forces carried out six missile attacks and 55 airstrikes across Ukraine on Friday and overnight, killing greater than 70 “Glide bombs” — converted Soviet-era weapons which have caused devastating damage within the country in recent weeks.
In Russia, two civilians were injured when Ukrainian forces shelled a border town within the southern Belgorod region overnight, governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
The Russian Defense Ministry said its troops shot down a complete of eight drones over the Kursk and Belgorod regions within the south throughout the night.
In Krasnodar province in Russian-annexed Crimea, local authorities reported damage caused overnight by falling drone debris. Debris sparked a fireplace at an oil depot, set fuel tanks ablaze elsewhere and damaged a cellular phone tower, the reports said. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
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