The President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky said that about 2.5-3 thousand Ukrainian servicemen have died so far in the war with the Russian Federation, the UNIAN news agency reported, quoting Zelensky’s interview with CNN.
For comparison, the number of Russian servicemen who have died so far is about 19-20 thousand, said the Ukrainian president
The head of state added that about 10,000 Ukrainian servicemen were wounded and that “it is difficult to say how many of them will survive.”
He noted that the number of civilian casualties is more difficult to calculate.
“It is very difficult to talk about civilians, because in the southern part of our country, where towns and villages are blocked – Kherson, Berdyansk, Mariupol in the east, and the area in the east, where Volnovakha is located – we just do not know how many people have died in this blocked area, “Zelenski said.
Yesterday, Ukrainian police said the bodies of more than 900 civilians, most of whom had been shot, had been found near the capital, Kyiv.
The shocking number came shortly after Russia’s defense ministry promised to step up missile attacks on Kyiv in response to alleged Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory. The warning comes after the unexpected loss of Moscow’s flagship in the Black Sea, which a senior US defense official said was hit by at least one Ukrainian missile.
Andriy Nebitov, the chief of police in the Kyiv region, said the bodies had been abandoned on the streets or buried in temporary graves. He quoted police as saying that 95% of the victims had died from gunshot wounds.
“Therefore, we understand that during the (Russian) occupation, people were simply executed in the streets,” Nebitov said. He added that new bodies are found every day under the rubble and in mass graves. “The highest number of victims was found in Bucha, where there are more than 350 bodies,” Nebitov said.
At the same time, the Ukrainian prosecutor’s office announced that it has launched an investigation into the deaths of 10 citizens and the injury of 35 others during the shelling of Kharkiv by Russian forces, UNIAN reported. According to the report, a 7-month-old baby was among the dead. Many homes were damaged or destroyed, prosecutors said.
Explosions in Kyiv and Lviv
Explosions were heard this morning in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv and the western city of Lviv, but there are no reports of casualties or damage, Reuters reported.
The mayor of Kyiv said rescuers and medics were working on-site on the outskirts of the city.
In an online post, Vitali Klitschko reported on “explosions” in the Darnytskyi district, in the eastern part of the capital, and added that details of possible victims would be announced later, according to the Associated Press.
Klitschko called on residents to respond to air-raid sirens and warned people fleeing the city not to return for their safety.
Pillars of thick smoke could be seen rising from the center of Kyiv, rising above the eastern part of the city, the AP notes.
