More Russian civilians killed by Ukrainian strikes – governor
Three people were killed and several others injured, including a child, in the Ukrainian shelling of the village of Sobolevka in Russia’s Belgorod Region on Friday, Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
Two fatalities were reported initially, but Gladkov wrote on Telegram on Saturday that the death toll had risen.
A total of 11 projectiles from a Grad multiple rocket launcher were fired at Sobolevka, located some 14km from the border with Ukraine, he said.
Two local men were killed outside their homes in the attack, while a woman who suffered penetrating wounds to her abdomen and chest died on the way to hospital, according to the governor.
Seven residents of Sobolevka were also injured in the strike, all but one of whom required hospitalization, he said.
In an earlier post, Gladkov said an 11-year-old girl was among the wounded after receiving “a shrapnel injury to the left eye.”
Two women were killed in a separate attack on Shebekinsky District after shell fragments hit their car during a cross-border strike on a road in the village of Maslova Pristan. According to Gladkov, a total of eight civilians were also injured in Shebekinsky District, which had been targeted by intensive attacks this week.
Several other settlements in the region, including its main city Belgorod, have also suffered property damage as result of Ukrainian shelling, the governor said.
The frequent attacks prompted Gladkov to announce the evacuation of children from the areas closest to the border with Ukraine this week.
On Thursday, the Russian military said it had repelled an attempted incursion by Ukrainian forces into Belgorod Region. Kiev was aiming to “carry out a terrorist act against the civilian population of the town of Shebekino,” the Defense Ministry claimed. Two Ukrainian motorized infantry companies, reinforced by tanks, tried to cross into Russia, but suffered heavy losses and were pushed back, according to the ministry.
