A Russian strike on the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia killed at least 13 people, Ukrainian officials said, one of the deadliest single air attacks for weeks in the three-year war.
Moscow has ramped up its strikes on Ukraine since the onset of winter, casting some of the attacks as retaliation for Kyiv firing on Russian territory with Western-supplied weapons.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called Wednesday’s bombardment “cruel” and called for the world to rally around Ukraine, and against Russia, to bring about a “lasting peace”.
The strike came hours after Ukrainian drones hit an oil depot that supplies Russia’s air force, hundreds of kilometres (miles) behind the front lines, triggering a blaze that claimed the lives of two Russian firefighters.
“The Russians conducted two strikes with guided aerial bombs on the city of Zaporizhzhia. They exploded among crowds of people,” Ukraine’s interior ministry said in a statement.
Thirteen people were killed and at least 30 wounded in the attack, Zelensky said, accusing Russia of deliberately targeting civilians.
“There is nothing more cruel than launching aerial bombs on a city, knowing that ordinary civilians will suffer,” he said in a message on social media.
“This again demonstrates what Russia really wants. They want only war and only victims.”
The Ukrainian leader will attend a meeting of Ukraine’s key allies in Germany on Thursday in a bid to rally support for Kyiv.
Zaporizhzhia had a pre-war population of around 700,000 and lies around 35 kilometres (20 miles) from the frontline in southern Ukraine.
Russia controls swathes of the surrounding Zaporizhzhia region, and claims to have annexed it in 2022.
Rumours have swirled in Ukraine about a possible fresh Russian offensive towards the regional capital, which has been repeatedly struck by Russian forces since they invaded nearly three years ago.
Another Russian strike on Wednesday killed two people in the village of Stepnogirsk, around 30 kilometres south of Zaporizhzhia and close to the frontline, Governor Ivan Fedorov said on social media.
Four people became trapped under a house that was hit by Russian shelling there, two were pulled from the rubble but the other two were found dead, he said.