In the city of Kremenchug, the Poltava region, the rocket hit the shopping center. There were more than a thousand people there

Vladimir Zelensky: “No threat to the Russian army. No strategic value "

The Russian military inflicted a missile blow to the shopping center in the city of Kremenchug, Poltava region , said President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky. According to him, at that moment there were more than a thousand people in the shopping center. “The number of victims cannot even be imagined. No threat to the Russian army. No strategic value, ”said the Ukrainian president.

The exact number of victims is still unknown. According to the latest data, 18 people were killed as a result of the strike, at least 50 were still injured and about 40 are missing , the office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine, the Iglav Poltava Regional Administration, Dmitry Lunin said. The rescue operation continues, 115 firefighters and 20 of the State Service of Ukraine for Emergencies were involved in the extinguishing of a fire in the shopping center.

Updated . The Ukrainian side said that the Kremenchug hit was inflicted by two X-22 missiles from the Tu-22 m3 distant bombers. The missiles were released in the Kursk region, one of them got into the shopping center, the other in the Kremenchug stadium.

Amstor shopping center was subjected to the attack near the Kremenchug railway station, the First Deputy Foreign Minister Emine Dzhaparova said (now her post is not available). Airy anxiety in the Poltava region was announced at about 15:40 local time (coincides with Moscow), it was canceled at 16:05.

In the pro-Kremlin telegram channels, a blow to the shopping center in Kremenchug was already called a “provocation” and compared with buchi . In particular, the journalist of the VGTRK Andrei Rudenko and the chief of the publication “Today.ru” Yuri Kotenok, as evidence of “Provocation”, said that there were few cars and women on the frames shot near the burning shopping center (“although it was at such a time to the women's sexes,” Rudenko noted). Later, the fact that the shelling of Kremenchug looks like a “provocation in Buch,” said the first political chairman of the Russian Federation at the UN Dmitry Polyansky.

Kremenchug is located hundreds of kilometers from the front line, but has already been shelling. The city has an oil refinery, which was the largest manufacturer of gasoline and diesel fuel in Ukraine. He stopped in the spring due to shelling (which became one of the main factors of gasoline deficiency in the country). Russian troops continued to beat at the factory and after its stop, the Ukrainian side reported the latter of such blows on June 18.

In the conditions of war, it is not always possible to quickly check the information that official representatives of one or another side of the conflict distribute.