Kharkiv mayor: nearly 1,180 large residential buildings destroyed
Weeks of Russian shelling of the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkov has caused major devastation, Mayor Ihor Terechov said Monday. Nearly 1,180 multi-storey residential buildings, more than 50 kindergartens, about 70 schools and 15 hospitals have been destroyed, Terechov told Ukraine’s UNIAN news agency.
In the past 24 hours, the country’s second largest city, which had a population of about 1.5 million before the war, has been shelled nearly 60 times with artillery and mortars. Residents of destroyed houses are housed in remaining (kindergarten) schools, cellars and metro stations. Despite the shelling, supermarkets in Kharkiv remain open and all necessary food is available, according to the mayor.
The city is receiving humanitarian aid from other cities and a shipment of drugs worth $880,000 (more than 800,000 euros) has arrived from the US. “Kharkov is a Russian-speaking city,” the newspaper Ukrayinska quoted Pravda Terechov as saying. He says many residents have friends and relatives in Russia. “People could never have imagined in their worst dreams that Russia would attack Ukraine and Kharkov,” the mayor said.
The capital Kiev has also been burdened by Russian bombing for some time. More than 100 people, including four children, have been killed since the start of the war on February 24, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said. Another 16 injured children are in hospital. The bodies of more than 20 people could not be identified, according to Klitschko. 82 multi-storey residential buildings have been destroyed.