A Russian double-tap strike on a Kryvyi Rih mall killed 16 people
Zelenskyy's hometown. A second drone hit about 30 minutes later, while rescuers were already there.
Russian drones hit a shopping mall in Kryvyi Rih on Friday afternoon, and a second strike followed about half an hour later. Regional governor Oleksandr Hanzha said on Saturday that 16 people were dead and more than 130 were wounded, including 22 children. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called the attack cynical, and said the second drone was aimed at emergency crews already at the site.
Kryvyi Rih is Zelenskyy's hometown. Local officials named the mall as Soniachna Halereia. Zelenskyy wrote that attacks like these are terrorist acts, and that Ukraine will respond. He also repeated the request for more air defence. Friday's strike came a day after a barrage on Kyiv that killed 17 people.
Russia's defence ministry said it had struck transport and logistics sites around Kyiv. Ukraine said it hit an oil refinery and an Ozon warehouse in Russia's Samara region overnight.
Yesterday's paper had Kyiv in mourning. Today's add is a mall in the president's hometown, hit twice so the second wave would catch the people who ran in to help. That is a method, not a stray drone. The interceptor shortage Zelenskyy talked about on Thursday is the same shortage, one city over.
Rescuers were still searching the wreckage on Saturday. Watch whether the death toll rises, and whether the air-defence request that followed the Kyiv strike gets any further after this one.