UPDATES CASUALTY FIGURES; ADDS DETAILS; REVISES HEADLINE; EDITS THROUGHOUT
By Burc Eruygur
ISTANBUL (AA) – At least four people were killed and eight injured in a missile attack in Ukraine’s southeastern Zaporizhzhia region early on Thursday.
Five more people are considered missing, including a child, the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office said in a statement.
The Russian missile destroyed a five-story building, while “debris and the blast wave damaged high-rises located nearby, as well as vehicles of residents,” the statement said.
Investigators are on the ground and a search and rescue operation is underway, it added.
An initial statement by Ukraine’s National Police said more than 10 apartments from the second to the fifth floor of the building were destroyed.
It said police and Ukrainian intelligence officers were carrying out inspections to “document the consequences of the occupiers’ war crime … and collect material evidence of Russian military aggression.”
Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office, said at least 20 people were evacuated from the area.
In a Telegram post early on Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denounced the attack by a “terrorist state (that) wants to turn every day for our people into a day of terror.”
He posted a tweet later in the day, vowing that Kyiv will not “give Russian evil a chance to dominate either in Ukraine or anywhere in the world.”
“This evil won’t avoid responsibility for the crimes committed,” he said.
Now in its second year, the Russia-Ukraine war has so far killed more than 8,100 civilians, with nearly 13,500 more wounded, according to latest UN figures.