Putin vows retaliation for alleged Ukraine strike on student dormitory

Russian President Vladimir Putin has pledged retaliatory action, alleging that Ukraine conducted a lethal attack on a student dormitory in occupied eastern Ukraine.

According to Russia’s emergency ministry, eighteen people were killed and 42 others injured in the overnight strike in the town of Starobilsk, in the Luhansk region. 

The ministry also reports that another three people are believed to be trapped under the rubble.

Ukraine’s military said it had hit the headquarters of Russia’s elite Rubicon drone military unit in Starobilsk. 

It did not say whether it was the same building as the one identified by Russia.

In his residence at the Kremlin in Moscow on Friday, Putin said there were “no military facilities, intelligence service facilities or related services in the vicinity”.

“Therefore, there is absolutely no basis for claiming that the munitions struck the building as a result of our air defence or electronic warfare systems,” he said at a reception in his Kremlin residence.

He ordered the Russian military to prepare “proposals” on how to retaliate.

The Russian leader said the Ukrainian strike had been carried out in three waves using 16 drones.

However, Russia’s state-run TV showed what it said was one of the injured students, identifying her as Diana Shovkun, aged 19.

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She had head injuries after being hit by a collapsing concrete slab, the report said.

According to the BBC, no photos or videos of those whom Moscow says were killed were shown.

Early on Saturday, Russian officials reported two people had been injured after falling debris from drones triggered a fire at an oil depot in Russia’s Black Sea port of Novorossiysk.

The general headquarters of the southern Krasnodar region said “several technical administrative buildings caught fire” and fragments of drones fell on a fuel terminal.

According to the headquarters, two people were injured and were being treated in hospital; no deaths were reported.

The general headquarters said drones had also damaged private homes in the port city of Anapa, further north.

Ukraine’s military said late on Friday that an overnight strike had targeted Rubicon’s headquarters in Starobilsk. 

It accused fighters from the special drone unit of regularly striking civilians and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine.

In a statement, Ukraine claimed that Ukrainian forces were “causing damage to military infrastructure and facilities used for military purposes, strictly adhering to the norms of international humanitarian law, laws and customs of war”.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, on Monday, stated that the headquarters of Russia’s security service FSB had been hit in the Moscow-seized area of Ukraine’s southern Kherson region.

About 100 Russian “occupiers” were either killed or injured, he added.

(BBC News)