Deadly aftermath of Putin’s ‘vile’ assault on Kharkiv ironmongery shop

Twelve people have been reported dead and at least 16 are still missing after new images show the deadly aftermath of a ‘vile’ strike carried out by Russia on a crowded DIY hardware store in Kharkiv.

The country’s second-largest city was still reeling from two attacks a day earlier when two guided bombs hit the Epicentr DIY hypermarket in a residential area of the city on Saturday afternoon, Regional Governor Oleh Syniehubov said on national television.

The strikes caused a massive fire which sent a column of thick, black smoke billowing hundreds of metres into the air.

Photographs show emergency workers at the site looking for 16 missing people. 

Forty-three people were injured, while 10 of the twelve dead had still not been identified, the local prosecutors’ office said.

Earlier reports suggested at least two of the dead were store employees.

Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov said around 120 people had been in the hardware store when the bombs struck, though earlier estimates suggested it was closer to 200.

‘The attack targeted the shopping centre, where there were many people – this is clearly terrorism,’ Terekhov said. 

In a post on Telegram, Ukraine’s Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said emergency services were searching for 16 people still missing after the strike.

Andriy Kudinov, director of the suburban shopping centre, told local media the hardware store was full of shoppers buying items for their summer cottages.

It took 16 hours to fully extinguish the fire at the centre, which had raged over an area of 13,000 square metres, Interior Minister Klymenko said.

Rescuers, medics and journalists occasionally had to rush away from the scene and take cover on the ground, fearing another strike, as has occurred during several recent Russian attacks.

Dmytro Syrotenko, a 26-year-old employee of the DIY centre, described panicked scenes.

‘I was at my workplace. I heard the first hit and with my colleague, we fell to the ground. 

‘There was the second hit and we were covered with debris. Then we started to crawl to the higher ground,’ said Syrotenko, who had a large gash on his face.

Syrotenko told Reuters he was taken to safety by a rescue worker who helped him, several colleagues, and shoppers.

Videos posted by witnesses on social media show a huge column of black smoke billowing into the sky from a fire in the store, located in an area of large stores beside a car park. 

Zelenskiy, in his nightly video address, denounced the strike as ‘yet another example of Russian madness. There is no other way to describe it.’

He said: ‘When we tell world leaders that Ukraine needs sufficient air defences, when we say we need real decisive measures to enable us to protect our people, so that Russian terrorists cannot even approach our border, we are talking about not allowing strikes like this to happen.’

Writing later on Telegram, Zelenskiy noted air raid alerts had been in effect in Kharkiv for more than 12 hours and 200 emergency workers and 400 policemen remained at the scene dealing with the aftermath of the attacks.

He denounced th attack as ‘vile’ and said: ‘Russia struck another brutal blow at our Kharkiv – at a construction hypermarket – on Saturday, right in the middle of the day,’ 

‘Only madmen like Putin are capable of killing and terrorising people in such a vile way.

‘There were a lot of workers and shoppers inside. Now the fire is on the whole territory.’ 

French President Emmanuel Macron, writing on social media platform X, denounced the attack on the store as ‘unacceptable.’ 

The past week has seen an uptick in strikes on the city after Russian troops stormed across the border, opening a new front north of the city.

Russia has bombarded Kharkiv, which lies less than 20 miles from its border, throughout the war, having reached its outskirts in a failed bid to capture it in 2022.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy issued a plea to Ukraine’s Western allies to help boost air defences to keep the country’s cities safe. 

French President Emmanuel Macron, writing on social media platform X, denounced the attack on the store as ‘unacceptable.

A separate early evening missile strike hit a residential building in the centre of the city of 1.3 million. 

The number of people wounded by that strike had climbed to 25 by Sunday morning.

The missile left a crater several metres deep in the pavement at the foot of the building, which also housed a post office, a beauty salon and a cafe.

Emergency workers ushered away residents of nearby apartment buildings. Some of the injured had blood on their faces.

Just over the border, in Russia’s Belgorod region, the regional governor said four residents died in Ukrainian attacks on Saturday.

Moscow denies deliberately targeting civilians, but thousands have been killed and injured during its 27-month invasion of Ukraine.

The latest attack came after Russia launched a ground offensive in the Kharkiv region on May 10. 

Ukraine said on Friday that it had managed to halt Moscow’s progress and was counterattacking.

On Saturday Russia shelled the village of Kupiansk-Vuzlovyi, a railway hub in the Kharkiv region near the border, wounding five, the regional prosecutor’s office said in a statement.

It said that two vehicles came under fire: a car with two passengers and an ambulance with a driver, a paramedic and a 64-year-old patient.

Russia also carried out air strikes on the Kupiansk district, damaging a factory and residential buildings, the prosecutor’s office said.

In the eastern Donetsk region, shelling on Saturday killed a 40-year-old woman and wounded four, said the head of the regional administration, Vadym Filashkin.

Russian forces also claimed yesterday it had captured another village in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. 

The Russian defence ministry said that troops had ‘taken control of the village of Arkhangelske’, located to the north of the city of Donetsk.

The small frontline village is near the town of Ocheretyne, which Russia said it had captured early this month. 

Ukraine’s General Staff said on Saturday that Russian forces were ‘particularly active’ near the town of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region.

It said six firefights were ongoing near the villages of Kalynove, Yasnobrodivka and Sokil, south of the village of Arkhangelske.

On Saturday, Ukraine said its forces had repelled two attacks in the Kharkiv region and fighting was continuing near the town of Vovchansk, which Moscow is attempting to seize.

Russia’s defence ministry said its troops had fought off two counter-attacks near the border, one close to Vovchansk, which Moscow is attempting to seize.