Russia strikes kill 11 in Kharkiv

Russian attacks on Ukraine’s Kharkiv region on Sunday killed at least 11 people, said authorities in the border area facing a new offensive by Moscow’s forces.
Russian troops since May 10 have carried out a ground assault in the northeastern region, where they have achieved their largest territorial gains in a year-and-a-half.
Their progress had been stopped, Kyiv said — a claim contradicted by Moscow.
Six people — including a pregnant woman — were killed on the outskirts of Kharkiv city by a missile attack launched from Russia’s territory of Belgorod, Ukrainian authorities said.
Twenty-seven were wounded in the strike on a recreation centre, with one employee missing, the prosecutors office said.
“Among the wounded is a police officer and an ambulance paramedic who came to help people after the first hit,” the Kharkiv prosecutors office said.
It accused Russian forces of “once again using the tactic of ‘repeated strike’...aimed at killing civilians, law enforcement officers, medics, and rescuers.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky reacted to the strike, saying Russia used its weapons to “terrorise our cities and communities, to kill ordinary people”.
Zelensky asked for “two Patriots for Kharkiv (which) will fundamentally change the situation”, referring to the sophisticated US-made air defence system.
Shortly after, authorities reported another attack in the Kharkiv region.
“Five civilians were killed and nine injured as a result of shelling of Novoosynove and Kivsharivka villages with multiple rocket launchers,” governor Oleg Synegubov said.
In his evening address, Zelensky said his forces had strengthened their defences in the area.
“As a result of these days — of the whole week — we have secured stronger positions in the Kharkiv region,” he said.
Ukraine’s General Staff said Russian attacks in the Kharkiv area “slowed down a bit” on Sunday but that forces “continue their attempts to break through our defences near Vovchansk, Starytsya and Lyptsi.” Russia’s defence ministry, which had claimed to have seized Starytsya, said its units “continued to advance into the depth of the enemy’s defences”. Moscow said it shot down 61 Ukrainian drones overnight, most of them above the southern region of Krasnodar. Six drones fell on the territory of the Slovyansk-on-Kuban refinery in the region and forced it to halt operations, its management and authorities said. “There have been strikes. The plant is currently at a standstill. We are assessing the damage,” Eduard Trutnev, the refinery head of security, told Interfax news agency.