Eleven people were killed on January 6 when Russian troops shelled the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region, the governor of the Ukrainian-controlled part of the region said.
Live Briefing: Russia's Invasion of Ukraine
RFE/RLs Live briefing provides you with the latest developments on Russia's large-scale invasion, Kiev's counteroffensive, Western military assistance, the global response and the plight of civilians. For all of RFE/RL's coverage of the war in Ukraine: Click here.
Vadym Filashkin said five children were among those killed Rocket attack on Pokrovska city in Ukrainian-controlled territory about 80 kilometers northwest of the city of Donetsk, which lies in the Russian-controlled center of the region.
“The Russians hit the region with S-300 missiles, killing 11 people and wounding another eight,” Filashkin said in Telegram. The main attack hit Pokrovsk and surrounding villages. he saidHe added that the attack showed that Russian forces were “trying to inflict as much suffering as possible on our country.”
President Volodymyr Zelensky responded in his late-night video address, saying Russia must feel the consequences of any such attack.
“The Russian attack was directed against ordinary residential buildings and private houses,” Zelensky said. “Russia must feel – always feel – that no such attack will be without consequences for the terrorist state.”
Reports of the deaths in Pokrovsk came after the Ukrainian Air Force announced it destroyed a Russian command center at the Saky air base on the occupied Crimean peninsula in a night attack.
“All targets were shot down,” said Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk wrote on Telegramand added that Russia had lost “another command post in Crimea.”
Ukraine said on January 5 that it had carried out separate attacks on a Russian military command post and a military unit in Crimea, causing “serious damage” to Russia's defense system.
Natalya Humenyuk, spokeswoman for the Defense Forces of Southern Ukraine, said that “really intense combat operations” took place earlier this week, hitting Russia's military operations in Crimea particularly hard.
“Not just one command post was affected,” she said in a rare description of Ukrainian operations.
Russia claimed on January 6 that its forces fired four Ukrainian missiles in Crimea overnight.
The reports cannot be independently verified.
Since Moscow's brutal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Ukraine's armed forces have carried out frequent attacks on Russian military targets in Crimea, which was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.
Saky airfield made headlines in September 2023 when Ukraine said its military attacked the facility, causing “severe damage” to equipment at the site. Crimean officials appointed by Moscow denied the claim.
The air base was also the subject of a Ukrainian attack in August of the previous year. Kiev claimed the attack destroyed at least nine military aircraft, including Su-30SM fighters and Su-24M bombers.
SEE ALSO: Ukraine takes credit for missile attacks on Russian military bases in Crimea
Both Ukraine and Russia have escalated attacks in recent days as the military conflict drags on for nearly two years.
In Moscow, a senior Russian official was quoted as saying that Russia plans to produce 32,500 drones every year by 2030 and allocate $7.66 billion to the project.
“This is almost three times the current production volumes,” First Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov was quoted as saying by the TASS news agency on January 6.
Drones have been used extensively in both Moscow and Kiev since the start of the war. Russia relies primarily on cheap, Iranian-made Shahed drones for its airstrikes on Ukrainian infrastructure far beyond the front lines in the east and south of the country.
Meanwhile, in Ukraine, first-person view drones (FVP) are being used extensively – small drones originally intended for personal civilian use but modified for use on the battlefield.
Kiev announced last month that it plans to produce more than 11,000 medium- and long-range attack drones and 1 million FPV drones in 2024.
With reporting from AFP, dpa and Portal