Ukraine’s military denied that it struck a student dormitory in the Russian-controlled Luhansk region on Friday (22 May).
The denial came after Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his military to prepare retaliation options for the attack, which he said had killed six people, including children.
Ukraine’s General Staff said the overnight attack on 21-22 May in the occupied city of Starobilsk had targeted an elite drone unit, and dismissed accusations that it had struck a student dormitory as “manipulation.”
Putin described the strike as an intentional attack on a student dormitory, which he said left six people dead, dozens injured and 15 still unaccounted for.
“There are no military facilities, intelligence service facilities, or related services in the vicinity. Therefore, there is absolutely no basis for claiming that the munitions struck the building as a result of our air defence or electronic warfare systems,” the Russian president said.
“The strike was not accidental; it came in three waves, with 16 drones targeting the same location,” he added, noting that the Russian military had been ordered to draw up options for Moscow to retaliate.
Ukraine wants to recapture Luhansk, one of four eastern regions that Moscow unilaterally claimed as its own in 2022, in what Kyiv denounced as an illegal land grab.
Yana Lantratova, Russia’s human rights commissioner, said 86 teenagers aged 14 to 18 had been asleep inside the hostel belonging to Luhansk Pedagogical University’s Starobilsk College when Ukrainian drones attacked it during the night.
Leonid Pasechnik, the top Russian-installed official in Luhansk, said two people had been pulled from the rubble. Maria Lvova-Belova, Russia’s presidential commissioner for children’s rights, said up to 18 children could still be trapped.
Some of the children being treated in hospital were reported to be in a serious condition, Lvova-Belova added.
Lyubov Yakovlevna, a local resident, told Reuters she heard loud explosions from the attack, which she said had first been carried out by rockets and had targeted what she described as a former base.
She said she then heard drones targeting the student dormitory, causing fires to break out and forcing people to seek shelter in her apartment block.
“A shock wave went through our apartment. Nobody could sleep all night. We were watching the fires. I was afraid, I was shaking, it was really terrifying,” she said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called for those responsible to be punished.
“This is a monstrous crime. An attack on an educational institution where children and young people are present,” he told reporters.
The UN voiced alarm over reports of the strike, but said it did not have access to the area and could not verify the details.
Photographs and video released by Russian authorities showed rescue workers recovering one man from the rubble, as well as severely damaged buildings.
Meanwhile, the International Atomic Energy Agency said Ukraine had informed it that a fire broke out at the Dniprovska 750-kilovolt electrical substation on Friday because of military activity. The fire partially disrupted off-site power supplies to the South Ukraine nuclear power plant, according to the IAEA.
The UN nuclear watchdog said the country’s second-largest nuclear power plant was partially disconnected from its off-site power supplies at the request of the grid operator as a result of the incident.
Elsewhere in the conflict, two people were injured in Russia’s Black Sea port of Novorossiysk after falling debris from a drone triggered a fire at an oil terminal, Russian officials said early on Saturday.
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