A Russian drone attack on a passenger bus in the Mykolaiv region of southern Ukraine on Wednesday morning left five dead and at least seven injured. Volodymyr Zelensky, the President of Ukraine, described this attack as the latest in a series of Russian assaults on civilian transport and labeled it a "crime."
Details of the Attack
The attack occurred in the Mykolaiv region, located in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast and near the front lines of the war. Oleksandr Hanzhа, the head of the regional military administration, announced that all the deceased died at the scene of the incident, and seven injured individuals are receiving medical care.
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Zelensky described the type of vehicle as a minibus in a post on the social media platform X, stating that this attack had "no military justification" and is related to the ongoing targeting of logistical and critical infrastructure.
Further Attacks and Their Consequences
Zelensky also announced that another passenger train in the Mykolaiv region was attacked on the same day, resulting in damage to a railway station and a diesel locomotive. Nearly 170 passengers on the train were evacuated before the attack. An electric locomotive was also targeted in the town of Khol in northwestern Ukraine.
Russian attacks on Ukraine's rail network since the start of the war in February 2022 have resulted in damage or destruction of over 500 locomotives, with more than half of these attacks occurring this year. Andrii Sybiha, Ukraine's Foreign Minister, described these attacks as "systematic" and emphasized Ukraine's urgent need for replacements for the damaged locomotives.
Sybiha also urged his country's partners to assist in finding locomotives compatible with Ukraine's 1520 mm rail gauge and to finance them. He stated, "These attacks are not collateral damage. This is a systematic hunt for individuals and an attempt to paralyze civilian life."
In an interview with CBS News, Zelensky responded to a previous claim by U.S. President Donald Trump regarding an agreement between Ukraine and Russia to mutually cease attacks on each other's energy infrastructure, stating that Ukraine is ready to enter into such an agreement if Russia ends its attacks on Ukrainian energy facilities.
Meanwhile, 17 other locations in the Kyiv region were damaged between Tuesday and Wednesday morning, including eight private houses, five vehicles, one government building, one warehouse, and one production facility. Zelensky also announced that the regions of Kherson, Donetsk, and Poltava were also under attack.
The Russian Ministry of Defense reported that its air defense systems shot down 71 Ukrainian drones overnight. In the Belgorod region, one person was killed and four others were injured as a result of Ukrainian attacks in the past 24 hours.
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Source: abcnews.com
