Ed Miliband lays teddy at Ukraine wreckage the place 22 individuals together with three one-year-olds killed
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky joined Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband to walk through the rubble, and survey the damage caused by the strike as families slept
Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband laid a teddy bear beside the wreckage of an apartment block, where a Russian missile strike killed 22 people, including five children.
Three children aged just one were among the dead pulled from the rubble in Pryluky, a town to the east of Kyiv.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky joined the Foreign Secretary to walk through the rubble, and survey the damage caused by the strike as families slept.
Mr Miliband said the evidence of Vladimir Putin’s evil strategy was laid bare, and said there was clear evidence the Kremlin was committing war crimes by attacks on ordinary Ukrainians. “He’s trying to win by terrorising civilians,” he said.
Mr Zelensky has described the attack on Pryluky on October 6 as a “birthday gift” to Putin by the Russian military, as it happened on the Kremlin tyrant’s birthday.
Mr Miliband also went to meet those injured in the blast in hospital. The town was hit by five cruise missiles, one of which hit the apartment building, according to Chernihiv regional head Vyacheslav Chaus.
Mr Zelensky named the one-year-old victims as Oleksandr, Kyrylo, and Serhii.
The Ukrainian President said his country urgently needed more air defence support. He told journalists at the strike site: “We can’t wait. These attacks on civilians are the face of Putin. We can’t just wait for Ukrainian production to produce all the air defence our country needs.
“That’s why we are asking our allies for help. The UK can’t provide the very specific air defence we need but they can support us financially and we can buy from the USA and other countries.”
He added: “This is an ordinary good city with good people and they have to survive without enough air defence. The first reason is Putin, he is crazy and a terrorist, he is a killer. During his birthday he attacked and killed so many people.”
He urged President Trump to do more to push Putin to the negotiating table.
Mr Miliband said the UK was Ukraine’s number one ally, and would push its friends to help Kyiv with interceptor missiles to thwart attacks. Standing alongside Mr Zelensky, he said: “We as a country pride ourselves on our values. A commitment to freedom, to democracy, to countering injustice in the world. There can be no greater cause than this cause.”
While in Ukraine, Mr Miliband unveiled fresh sanctions to hit individuals and companies funding Putin’s war machine. The package includes 12 Russian shadow ships, an ageing fleet of tankers funnelling cash to the Kremlin by transporting around the world.
Three crypto exchanges and two payment platforms have also been sanctioned, including some linked to the Kremlin-backed A7 network which moves money around to avoid international sanctions.
In a post on social media on Thursday morning, Mr Zelensky confirmed the search-and-rescue operation in Pryluky had been completed, as he sent condolences to their families of the 22 who died. He added: “Fifty-four people were injured, including seven children. More than 500 emergency service professionals were involved at the site. I thank every one of them – 15 people have been rescued since yesterday, including a five-year-old child.”
He added that the Russians are continuing striking Ukraine, “even after such a brutal attack”. This morning Russia hit a public transport stop in Kramatorsk with an aerial bomb, which as of now has killed 12 people, Mr Zelensky said. He also said a strike on a residential building in Kyiv claimed two lives.
