Donate This investigation was also undertaken with an awareness of international humanitarian law which imposes limits to how parties to a conflict may conduct hostilities and under which civilians and civilian objects – including in particular hospitals the environment and objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population – are protected actions that violate these safeguards may constitute war crimes and also potentially crimes against humanity and analysis of the investigative findings from these incidents the authors hope to preserve critical information that may be used for advocacy purposes or as evidence in future legal proceedings seeking accountability The authors have strived to incorporate a “risk minimisation” ethical framework into its processes Due to the repeated targeting of hospitals particularly by Russian-backed “DPR/LPR” “people’s militias” and by Russian Federation armed forces additional precautions and ethical issues were taken into consideration In order to help establish that digital content is what it purports to be, rigorous verification steps, guided  by the Berkeley Protocol and international guidelines on digital open-source investigations must be taken to authenticate the  findings The Kremenchuk Oil Refinery sits in the northernmost section of the city of Kremenchuk, which is located on the Dnipro River in Poltava Oblast. The city is rich in iron and oil deposits Although always an important industrial center its role as such grew in 2014 when Russian forces took control of many industrial areas in Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts Its factories became a target for the Russian armed forces during their assault on Ukraine in 2022 As of September 2021 the refinery employed approximately 3,000 people The strikes resulted in substantial fires at several sites around the refinery and the release of a large quantity of pollutants into the countryside to the north as well as the densely populated city of Kremenchuk to the south The Kremenchuk Oil Refinery is located in the northernmost part of Kremenchuk at coordinates 49.175 it is probable that it took place no earlier than 05:37 local time and no later than 07:35 local time The attack caused damage to at least six sites at the refinery This analysis is based on visual inspection of high resolution satellite imagery collected on 06 April 2022 from Planet SkySat It is possible that there was further damage that was not detectable on this imagery which we have geolocated to this location (Figure 2 Two large storage tanks were destroyed at Site 2 These likely ignited the adjacent vegetation 100 hectares of which appear charred on satellite imagery from 06 April 2022 and where a fire was detected via FIRMS on 02 April 2022 whilst a further tank may also have been damaged bringing the total number of large vertical storage tanks damaged or destroyed to at least 19 The attack also damaged other areas of the refinery Site 5 appears to be the hub for transferring oil products onto rail transport and it suffered substantial damage to buildings and pipework where a building housing electrical equipment suffered significant damage the video could not be geolocated to the Kremenchuk Oil Refinery These factors may indicate that footage of a different attack was used creating a false impression that the narrative and the video are of the same attack Given that Kremenchuk is located deep inside Ukrainian territory during this attack and well out of range of conventional and rocket artillery the types of weapons systems that could reach it are limited to long-range missiles The large fires and burning of petroleum emit greenhouse gases and short-lived climate forcers, like black carbon. Indeed the climate impact may be quite complex, with emissions from the out-of-service refinery instead displaced, or novel sources of emissions such as SF6 from damaged switchgears The attacks have also led to considerable waste and debris. This waste can be a secondary pollution source, containing hazardous materials like asbestos. The proper treatment of this debris is a challenge given pressure on solid waste management in the city There is a risk that if improperly managed it may lead to a displacement of the contamination In subsequent reports on the attacks at Kremenchuk Oil Refinery we will take a deeper dive into other environmental issues The focus of this report is the air pollution as a result of the attack The primary environmental impact in the short-term was due to the significant smoke plumes generated by the multiple plumes at different facilities The smoke will have contained very high concentrations of particulate matter (PM) volatile organic compounds (VOCs) such as formaldehyde hydrocarbons and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) If there was also a fire at the substation the environmental risk is even higher – PCBs break down into the more toxic dibenzofurans and dibenzodioxins but its provisions governing the protection of the environment during armed conflicts remain ineffective This note explores the parallel international regimes governing the actions of Russian soldiers in respect to the war in Ukraine Using the example of the attacks on the Kremenchuk Oil Refinery it will show the shortcomings of international law in protecting the environment from the damage during excesses of war The primary legal regime governing all wartime activities is international humanitarian law and API contains provisions governing harm to the environment A final factor that makes this standard difficult to apply is that it does not correspond to the nature of environmental destruction during armed conflict Destruction of this type is often cumulative amassing over the full length of the armed conflict whereas the prohibition in Article 35(3) API appears to apply only to individual means or methods of warfare Even if it does apply to the refinery case it should be emphasised that this provision is not an environmental one and any environmental effects would be legally irrelevant for the purposes of liability Only one provision of the Rome Statute refers explicitly to harm to the environment Article 8(2)(b)(iv) of the Rome Statute codifies a war crime of launching an attack that creates widespread long-term and severe damage to the environment that clearly exceeds the concrete and direct overall military advantage of such an attack There are three reasons why this crime is incredibly difficult to evidence First, since the qualitative elements of this standard – “widespread, long-term and severe” – are cumulative and likely to be interpreted in accordance with 35(3) API, they set a very high threshold for culpable harm an additional complication is that in the context of international criminal law long-term and severe damage – as well as the knowledge of the perpetrators that such harm would arise – will have to be proven beyond reasonable doubt the provision further weakens environmental protection by allowing perpetrators to justify the environmental damage using the vague notion of “concrete and direct overall military advantage.” While there are obviously no efforts by Russia to end impunity for crimes committed by its soldiers the Ukrainian Office of the Prosecutor General has launched several investigations into potential acts of ecocide arising out of the Russian invasion of Ukraine It remains to be seen what impact the renewed attention to environmental crimes will have at the international level the effectiveness of environmental crime prosecutions is not only a matter of substantive law but also highly contingent on case selection and prioritization International human rights law continues to apply during armed conflicts, and there is growing acceptance of a human right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment, as evidenced by a UN General Assembly resolution and UN Human Rights Council resolution 48/13 This right requires states to take positive steps to protect the environment While it is highly controversial to what extent the right to a healthy environment is currently binding law limiting the actions of states like Russia the emergence of human rights should be understood as a dynamic process in which previously unrecognized rights can grow into full binding effect through the practice and recognition of states Insofar as Russia’s military operations are taking place on the territory of Ukraine although human rights are traditionally considered to apply primarily only on the territory of the respective state there is increasing recognition of their extraterritorial applicability at least in situations where states exercise effective control over the territory of a third country where human rights are applicable extraterritorially in the context of armed conflict they are usually applied to a lesser extent the right to life continues to apply during armed conflict but it generally only prohibits killings that are not compliant with international humanitarian law Analogising with the right to a healthy environment this may be interpreted by human rights courts as only requiring the degree of protection of the environment mandated by international humanitarian law international human rights law runs the risk of being as permissive of conflict-related environmental destruction as international humanitarian law international environmental law also continues to apply during armed conflicts the Paris Agreement favours procedural over substantive obligations in reaching its goal Article 4 merely requires Russia to prepare and submit nationally determined contributions outlining its emissions reductions targets and does not require Russia to assess its harmful environmental activities extraterritorially in the war in Ukraine Turning to customary international environmental law all states are under an obligation to abide by the precautionary principle when engaging in activities causing large scale environmental impacts This requires exercising caution and taking prior steps before engaging in the potentially polluting activity such as carrying out environmental impact assessments This has not been applied to the context of war and it may be considered that a more specific version of the precautionary principle is codified in Article 55(1) API which requires belligerent states to take care to protect the environment from widespread long-term and severe damage to the environment How these principles interact may require some clarification A final source of obligations applicable to the Ukraine war is in the principles on the protection of the environment in relation to armed conflicts drafted by the International Law Commission (which have been analysed by the Conflict and Environment Observatory) While its provisions may constitute a mixture of binding and non-binding law progressive development and evolutive interpretation consensus may well emerge among states elevating all of its principles to binding rules that protect the environment While these principles are wider ranging than current international environmental law or international humanitarian law the general protection standard at principle 13 applies only to “widespread The analysis of the attack on the Kremenchuk Oil Refinery underscores the complexities of protecting the environment during armed conflict Not only can the effects on the environment and the people which reside there be far-reaching they are also difficult to accurately measure and predict The mechanism for holding state perpetrators of environmental crimes accountable is sometimes insufficient for bringing about reparations for victims Under the current legal and political circumstances obtaining reparations for damage done to the Ukrainian environment will be challenging © 2025 Conflict and Environment Observatory | Charity No: 1174115 | Design by Open & Honest You don't have permissions to access this page World Subscribers only 'A Pope in the tradition of Francis': From New York to Ghana Catholics hope for continuity at the Vatican World Subscribers only Chancellor Merz's diplomatic first week 2025."> World Trump's proposal to reopen Alcatraz deemed 'absurd' in San Francisco World Subscribers only Founder of Sant'Egidio community fears next pope could undo Francis's legacy Opinion Subscribers only 'Russian gas and Europe is an old story that ended badly Economy Subscribers only Europe's steel industry flattened by crisis World Subscribers only How European countries plan to fund defense efforts France Subscribers only Macron announces citizens' convention on school schedules France Subscribers only 21 charged over French prison attacks as investigation narrows in on drug traffickers France Subscribers only French mosque stabber was driven by 'morbid fascination,' prosecutor says France Subscribers only At the trial of Kim Kardashian's robbers Videos World expos: From Paris 1855 to Osaka 2025 Videos How the Trump administration is attacking scientific research in the US Videos Tesla cars set on fire in Las Vegas as calls to boycott Musk's company grow worldwide Videos Can France's nuclear deterrent protect Europe Opinion Subscribers only 'It is pointless to imagine a significant wave of American academics leaving' Opinion Subscribers only 'The American dream is dying' Opinion Subscribers only 'The trade war creates new opportunities for Europeans and France' Magazine Subscribers only Tracking down the pianos taken from French Jews during the Nazi Occupation Magazine Subscribers only Eve Rodsky the American helping couples balance the mental load Magazine Subscribers only Desecration or more glory Joan Didion's private diaries are revealed Magazine Subscribers only For Jewish cartoonist Joann Sfar 2025."> Pixels Subscribers only Golden Owl solution is revealed but leaves players of 31-year hunt disappointed Pixels Subscribers only Secrets of decades-long Golden Owl treasure hunt to be revealed Lifestyle Inside Chanel's French leather workshops Culture Subscribers only The marvelous bronzes of Angkor on display at the Musée Guimet in Paris FeatureThe attack on the working-class town's shopping center on June 27 The city is now renaming its streets after Ukrainian soldiers who died on the front line while others took out their cell phones to monitor the trajectory of the missiles via Telegram channels it's flying more to the east." An hour later A voice called out: "Glory to the air defense!" residents took a stroll along the esplanade of the Palace of Culture then an actor and now president of Ukraine Men and women in mourning dress arrived with carnations in hand a fighter with the Azov battalion and defender of the Azovstal factory in Mariupol in the explosion at the Olenivka prison in the Donbas enclave we were burying a soldier every day." As the coffin was carried out the congregation kneeled down on their left knee: a Cossack tribute to the war dead a large sign read: "Heroes don't die," a motto born on Maidan Square an alley ran alongside graves that each bore the same date of death They were the victims of the Amstor shopping center bombing You have 70.46% of this article left to read Lecture du Monde en cours sur un autre appareil Vous pouvez lire Le Monde sur un seul appareil à la fois Ce message s’affichera sur l’autre appareil Parce qu’une autre personne (ou vous) est en train de lire Le Monde avec ce compte sur un autre appareil Vous ne pouvez lire Le Monde que sur un seul appareil à la fois (ordinateur En cliquant sur « Continuer à lire ici » et en vous assurant que vous êtes la seule personne à consulter Le Monde avec ce compte Que se passera-t-il si vous continuez à lire ici Ce dernier restera connecté avec ce compte Vous pouvez vous connecter avec votre compte sur autant d’appareils que vous le souhaitez mais en les utilisant à des moments différents Nous vous conseillons de modifier votre mot de passe Votre abonnement n’autorise pas la lecture de cet article merci de contacter notre service commercial Please enable JS and disable any ad blocker This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks The action you just performed triggered the security solution There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article In the 20th century the city and the Kryukiv district across the river developed important metallurgical and engineering industries; products included steel castings Iron ore historically has been mined in the vicinity and oil from the river’s west-bank area has been refined In 1959 a large hydroelectric station was completed just north of the city a Russian Tu-22M3 pilot involved in attacks on Dnipro and Kremenchuk was eliminated near Bryansk according to the Main Intelligence Directorate the body of war criminal Dmytro Holienkov was found in a garden in the village of Suponevo near Bryansk The Russian pilot's body was discovered with multiple head injuries Dmitriy Holienkov was a pilot in the 52nd Heavy Bomber Aviation Regiment of the Russian Aerospace Forces (military unit 33310) He held the position of chief of staff of the Russian aviation squadron Holienkov was involved in missile strikes against Ukrainian civilian targets including the attack on the Amstor shopping center in Kremenchuk approximately 1,000 people were present in the mall This war crime resulted in the deaths of 22 individuals He was also responsible for a missile strike on a residential building in Dnipro on January 14 which claimed the lives of 46 Ukrainian civilians Russia acknowledged the elimination of Major General Kanamat Botashev which was shot down by Ukrainian forces in the Luhansk region on May 22 Essential digital access to quality FT journalism on any device Complete digital access to quality FT journalism with expert analysis from industry leaders Complete digital access to quality analysis and expert insights complemented with our award-winning Weekend Print edition Terms & Conditions apply Discover all the plans currently available in your country See why over a million readers pay to read the Financial Times Connecting decision makers to a dynamic network of information Bloomberg quickly and accurately delivers business and financial information 2022 at 3:05 PM EDTBookmarkSaveLock This article is for subscribers only.Russian missiles hit a shopping center in a central Ukrainian city killing at least 13 people and injuring dozens as attacks on civilian targets get closer to the heart of the country More than 1,000 people were at the mall at the time of the attack on Kremenchuk, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Facebook on Monday Ukrainian State Emergency Service firefighters work to extinguish a fire at a shopping center burned after a rocket attack in Kremenchuk Ukrainian State Emergency Service firefighters to take away debris at a shopping center burned after a rocket attack in Kremenchuk People watch as smoke bellows after a Russian missile strike hit a crowded shopping mall Ukrainian officials say scores of civilians are feared killed or injured after a Russian missile strike hit a crowded shopping mall in the central city of Kremenchuk Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a Telegram post Monday that the number of victims was “unimaginable,” citing reports that more than 1,000 civilians were inside at the time of the attack A Ukrainian State Emergency Service firefighter reacts as he works to extinguish a fire at a shopping center burned after a rocket attack in Kremenchuk Volunteers and State Emergency Service firefighters work to extinguish a fire at a shopping center burned after a rocket attack in Kremenchuk Medical workers load a body of a man killed during shelling in a yard of an apartment building in Kharkiv A woman cries after the body of her husband who was killed in a yard of an apartment building during shelling EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - A body of a man killed during shelling lies in a yard of an apartment building in Kharkiv In this image made from video provided by Ukrainian State Emergency Service firefighters work to extinguish a fire at a shopping center burned after a rocket attack in Kremenchuk (Ukrainian State Emergency Service via AP) A crater in the courtyard of kindergarten in the aftermath of Russian missile strikes fired toward Kyiv early Sunday Damages seen in the sleeping room of a kindergarten in the aftermath of Russian missile strikes fired toward Kyiv early Sunday Damages seen in the classroom of a kindergarten in the aftermath of Russian missile strikes fired toward Kyiv early Sunday Damages seen in the bathroom of a kindergarten in the aftermath of Russian missile strikes fired toward Kyiv early Sunday Ukraine (AP) — Russian long-range bombers struck a crowded shopping mall in Ukraine’s central city of Kremenchuk with a missile on Monday raising fears of what President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called an “unimaginable” number of victims in “one of the most daring terrorist attacks in European history.” Zelenskky said that many of the more than 1,000 afternoon shoppers and staff inside the mall managed to escape dust and orange flames emanated from the wreckage with emergency crews rushing in to search broken metal and concrete for victims and put out fires Onlookers watched in distress at the sight of how an everyday activity such as shopping could turn into a horror The casualty figures were changing as rescuers searched the smoldering rubble into early Tuesday Ukraine’s emergency services reported late Monday that at least 16 people were dead and about 60 wounded Soldiers worked into the night to lug sheets of twisted metal and broken concrete as one drilled into what remained of the shopping center’s roof clouds of dark smoke still emanating from the ruins several hours after the fire had been put out “We are working to dismantle the construction so that it is possible to get machinery in there since the metal elements are very heavy and big and disassembling them by hand is impossible,” said Volodymyr Hychkan Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting in New York on Tuesday to discuss the attack In the first Russian government comment on the missile strike the country’s first deputy permanent representative to the United Nations alleged multiple inconsistencies that he didn’t specify claiming on Twitter that the incident was a provocation by Ukraine Russia has repeatedly denied it targets civilian infrastructure even though Russian attacks have hit other shopping malls The missile strike unfolded as Western leaders pledged continued support for Ukraine and the world’s major economies prepared new sanctions against Russia including a price cap on oil and higher tariffs on goods appeared ready to respond to Zelenskyy’s call for more air defense systems and NATO planned to increase the size of its rapid-reaction forces nearly eightfold — to 300,000 troops Zelenskyy said the mall presented “no threat to the Russian army” and had “no strategic value.” He accused Russia of sabotaging “people’s attempts to live a normal life he said it appeared Russian forces had intentionally targeted the shopping center and added “Today’s Russian strike at a shopping mall in Kremenchuk is one of the most daring terrorist attacks in European history.” He said Russia “has become the largest terrorist organization in the world.” Russia has increasingly used long-range bombers in the war Ukrainian officials said Russian Tu-22M3 long-range bombers flying over Russia’s western Kursk region fired the missile that hit the shopping center as well as another that hit a sports arena in Kremenchuk “Russia continues to take out its impotence on ordinary civilians It is useless to hope for decency and humanity on its part,” Zelenskyy said Kremenchuk Mayor Vitaliy Maletskiy wrote on Facebook that the attack “hit a very crowded area which is 100% certain not to have any links to the armed forces.” The United Nations called the strike “deplorable,” stressing that civilian infrastructure “should never ever be targeted,” U.N Group of Seven leaders issued a statement late Monday condemning the attack and saying that “indiscriminate attacks on innocent civilians constitute a war crime Russian President Putin and those responsible will be held to account.” The attack coincided with Russia’s all-out assault on the last Ukrainian stronghold in eastern Ukraine’s Luhansk province “pouring fire” on the city of Lysychansk from the ground and air At least eight people were killed and more than 20 wounded in Lysychansk when Russian rockets hit an area where a crowd gathered to obtain water from a tank The eastern barrage was part of Russian forces’ intensified offensive aimed at wresting the eastern Donbas region from Ukraine the Russian military and their local separatist allies forced Ukrainian government troops out of Lysychansk’s neighboring city the mayor of the city of Sloviansk — potentially the next major battleground — said Russian forces fired cluster munitions including one that hit a residential neighborhood Authorities said the number of victims had yet to be confirmed The Associated Press saw one fatality: A man’s body lay hunched over a car door frame his blood pooling onto the ground from chest and head wounds The blast blew out most windows in the surrounding apartment blocks and the cars parked below “Everything is now destroyed,” said resident Valentina Vitkovska “We are the only people left living in this part of the building I can’t even call to tell others what had happened to us.” at least six civilians were killed and 31 others wounded as part of intense Russian shelling against various Ukrainian cities over the past 24 hours — including Kyiv and major cities in the country’s south and east killed at least five people and wounded 15 Russian forces continued to target the key southern Black Sea port of Odesa A missile attack destroyed residential buildings and wounded six people at least five high-rise buildings and the last road bridge were damaged over the past day A crucial highway linking the city to government-held territory to the south was rendered impassable The city’s prewar population of around 100,000 has dwindled to fewer than 10,000 Analysts say that Lysychansk’s location high on the banks of the Siverskiy Donets River gives a major advantage to Ukrainian defenders The Russians could spend many months and much effort storming Lysychansk,” said military analyst Oleh Zhdanov leaders of the G7 countries unveiled plans to seek new sanctions and pledged to continue supporting Ukraine “for as long as it takes.” In a joint statement Monday after they held a session by video link with Zelenskyy the leaders underlined their “unwavering commitment to support the government and people of Ukraine in their courageous defense of their country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.” Washington was expected to announce the purchase of an advanced surface-to-air missile system for Ukraine Britain’s defense ministry said Russia is likely to rely increasingly on reserve forces in the coming weeks Analysts have said a call-up of reservists by Russia could vastly alter the balance in the war but could also come with negative political consequences for President Vladimir Putin’s government The Bellingcat Investigation Team is an award winning group of volunteers and full time investigators who make up the core of the Bellingcat's investigative efforts Dramatic images of the facility ablaze soon followed President Volodomyr Zelenskiy of Ukraine stated that there were 1,000 people inside the mall at the time of the attack At time of writing, 18 people are reported to have been confirmed dead with more missing Reuters reported that Ukraine’s air force command said that the shopping mall was hit by Russian X-22 missiles fired from Tu-22M3 bombers that flew from Shaykovka airfield in Russia’s Kaluga region Russian politicians and their supporters promptly justified the attack at times offering seemingly contradictory explanations Late on June 27, Russia’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, Dmitry Polansky, said that the incident was a “provocation” by Ukraine He added: “We’ll have to wait and see what our Ministry of Defence says but there are too many obvious inconsistencies This is exactly what the Kyiv regime needs to keep the focus on Ukraine in the run up to the [June 28] NATO summit,” in Madrid The next day Igor Konashenkov, spokesman of Russia’s Ministry of Defence, said at a press briefing that the country’s air force had carried out a “high precision air attack at hangars where armament and munitions were stored” delivered by the US and European countries at the Kremenchuk road machinery plant which is a few hundred metres north of the Amstor shopping mall was non-functioning and that it had caught fire as a result of the strikes on targets nearby Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov also blamed western media for misrepresenting the situation. “The Ministry of Defence has clearly explained it”, he remarked Yet as with other claims made by Russia, such as in Bucha and Kramotorsk earlier in the war these do not appear to be supported by the available open source evidence and videos from the scene Map of Ukraine showing the location of Kremenchuk As the MOD and foreign minister Lavrov’s statements show Russia does not dispute that the mall was impacted and it admits to carrying out a strike in Kremenchuk Footage on social media clearly shows the shopping centre ablaze Horror scenes in Kremenchuk, as a Russian missile hits a shopping centre. The man speaking on phone : “people were are the building, the walls are starting to fall in” pic.twitter.com/REDBFmuT3R — Oliver Carroll (@olliecarroll) June 27, 2022 Later imagery shows it completely burned out with the roof entirely caved in Голова ДСНС Сергій Крук : продовжуємо працювати на місці ракетного обстрілу торговельного центру у Кременчуці ➡️https://t.co/uM7mum9g3w pic.twitter.com/xiQZO4SxvO — DSNS.GOV.UA (@SESU_UA) June 27, 2022 Yet the Russian MOD’s comments state that the mall was only impacted as a result of the detonation of ammunition which it claimed was stored nearby at the Kremenchuk road machinery plant It also claimed a nearby train yard was hit ⚡💬@mod_russia: On June 27, Russian Aerospace Forces launched a high-precision air attack at hangars with armament and munitions delivered by USA and European countries at #Kremenchug road machinery plant. 1/3 pic.twitter.com/RtDAITZ9DN — Russian Embassy, UK (@RussianEmbassy) June 28, 2022 as well as open source footage videos posted online A selection of CCTV video from the Mis’ky park Terrifying footage shows the mayhem outside of the shopping mall in Kremenchuk that was struck yesterday by Russian missiles leaving 18 dead pic.twitter.com/9QFk8GKHis — Moshe Schwartz (@YWNReporter) June 28, 2022 A freeze-frame from one camera looking south towards the factory shows a plume of smoke (red arrow) in the direction of the Amstor mall A graphic shows the direction the location of explosions in Kremenchuk. Map source: Google maps. Image source a second strike appears to land much closer to the camera with flames clearly visible and reflected on the water A screen grab from a video posted to Twitter shows an explosion in Kremenchuk Satellite imagery confirms the areas that were hit by these missiles The below image comparison from the Sentinel-2 L1C satellites shows a comparison of the area around the factory and the mall before (the most recent clear imagery was from May 4) and after the strike Images captured by the Sentinel-2 L1C satellites show Kramenchuk before and after the June 27 strikes The roof of the shopping mall is flattened in the later image while there also seems to have been an impact at the edge of the industrial facility There appears to be little noticeable damage to the area in between the two strikes This is confirmed by Planet satellite imagery A high resolution satellite image from Kerenchuk shows two damaged sites Several buildings between the mall and the site of the second impact appear undamaged The distance between these two points is approximately 0.5 kilometres A Google Earth map details the distance between the sites of the two missile strikes in Kremenchuk A video shared by an advisor to the Ukrainian presidency late on June 28 appears to show the missile approaching the location of the mall and exploding on impact «Абсолютний тероризм», – каже @ZelenskyyUa та публікує відео навмисного удару ракетою по ТЦ в Кременчуку, коли там було багато людей. Російська пропаганда завжди бреше: немає жодної випадковості, це цілеспрямований продуманий удар задля залякування населення та масових жертв. pic.twitter.com/QGKWYwbSZt — Михайло Подоляк (@Podolyak_M) June 28, 2022 The CCTV camera in the above image can be geolocated here Geolocation of CCTV camera which recorded strike on the shopping mall aligned with the fact that the mall appears to have taken a direct hit given there is no clear or significant impact site anywhere in the area around it would seemingly undermine Russian MOD claims that a fire spread from the factory area the fact that multiple explosions could not be observed after the initial impact likely suggests that in contrast to ‘LNR’ politician Vasilyev’s claim munitions were not kept at the Amstor building A freeze frame of the video even appears to provide a view of the type of missile used Exactly what was hit within the plant by the second missile is also not entirely clear from open source evidence alone A series of smaller buildings visible in YouTube videos appear to populate the area that is detailed as being damaged in satellite imagery YouTube / Satellite imagery comparison of industrial area The building highlighted in the red square above also appears to have been damaged A GIF showing the damage caused by a missile strike in Kremenchuk Although one report in 2014 stated that the factory had been used to repair three military vehicles, this in itself does not prove that it was a storage site for US and European weapons and ammunition eight years later, as Russia has claimed. Vehicles being repaired at the facility would appear to tally up with it being a road machinery plant. Corporate videos taken in recent years show equipment in the plant such as furnaces It is not possible to verify Russian claims of the plant being an ammo dump from open sources alone The area of the factory that was hit is detailed as being the “workshop of the plant and greenhouse” in one regional media report. This is corroborated by one video posted to Facebook by a local which showed a huge crater at the site of the strike Official Russian accounts also shared claims that a train yard nearby had also been hit shows no sign of any damage to nearby the Kremenchuk train yard located to the east of the Amstor mall Location of Russian strikes in Kremenchuk on Planet Skysat imagery Some debris from the strike that hit the mall would likely have impacted a rail line that ran past back of the mall itself this was not close to where a diagram shared by Russian state accounts produced by the pro-Kremlin ‘War on Fakes’ project — Russian Embassy, UK (@RussianEmbassy) June 28, 2022 Russia also claimed in its reaction to the strike that the mall was not in use This claim was echoed by the likes of pro-Kremlin news site LifeNews It stated that a lack of recent reviews on Google for any other websites over recent months showed that it was closed at the time of the strikes Yet these claims omit key details to the contrary A blog post from the Comfy retail chain from June 25 listed its outlet at Halamenyuk Street 7 in Kremenchuk in a list of shops which had reopened – this is the address of the Amstor shopping mall A local Telegram channel shared a screenshot of messages on June 23 from what appears to be a closed Telegram chat group for Amstor employees stating that the shops would continue to work from 8AM to 9PM as usual Some people posted receipts of transactions undertaken at the mall in recent days to show it was indeed open Чек из магазина игрушек… за пару часов до 😡 pic.twitter.com/ZH5fUIFDcC — Serg (@SergZ50534513) June 28, 2022 Then there were posts by stores which stated they had been in operation when the strike happened Some offered their best wishes to staff who had been impacted A post on the Toy House Facebook page on June 28 offered condolences to staff that worked on site and were injured Silpo, a Ukrainian grocery store chain, stated that six of its employees were in hospital Comfy, the aforementioned retail chain, also stated that one of its employees had died in the attack posted an Instagram story about the fate of a 19-year-old barista who had been badly burnt in the blaze The coffee shop’s account shared her mother’s plea for help The BBC Reality Check team detailed how local Telegram groups had been highlighting that multiple people at the mall were missing in the hours after the attack It also pointed to a YouTube video by a Ukrainian family that had purportedly been recorded the day before the attack and showed the mall open The pro-Kremlin news website Regnum, as well as the aforementioned ‘fact check’ shared by the Russian Embassy also sought to prove that the mall was closed at the time of the attack – and Zelensky’s claim of 1,000 civilians present – due to the small number of vehicles at the car park satellite imagery of the mall going back to 2016 shows that there were many occasions during daylight hours when its car park was sparsely occupied Timelapse images from Google Earth / Maxar Images Imagery was captured between 11-12AM local time (9AM UTC) These claims also do not account for the possibility of visitors arriving by public transport. Mapping services show bus trolleybus and minibus stops in walking distance Pro-Kremlin media outlet EurasiaDaily, like the aforementioned ‘fact check’, claimed that only men of military age could be seen at the scene of the explosion This is also inconsistent with the available open source evidence in which several women were present after the attack A woman seen outside the shopping mall in Kremenchuk, likely a survivor of the attack. Screengrab from 00:40 in a video taken by a man who escaped the building, shared by Trukha / Twitter Furthermore, the presence of some men in military fatigues is not out of keeping with the aftermath of other attacks across Ukraine on civilian infrastructure behind frontlines, in which members of the territorial defence forces have been seen alongside firefighters The aforementioned Regnum article also stated that “there is information that equipment repaired at the nearby Kremenchuk road machinery plant was kept on the territory of the shopping mall” Alongside the ‘LNR’ politician Vasilyev’s assertions the Regnum and EurasiaDaily reports further illustrate a key trend in pro-Russian claims about the strike on Amstor — that the shopping mall was itself a military facility None of these sources provided any evidence for this claim nor has any open source information surfaced which might lend credence to it The Russian account of these events presented so far does not tally with the available open source evidence; neither have the Russian authorities provided any verifiable information which could substantiate their claims the open source evidence indicates that the Amstor shopping mall was not destroyed by an explosion erupting from the nearby industrial area video footage appeared to show a missile landed directly on the building – a central shopping mall serving a city of 219,000 At the time of publication, dozens are reported to remain missing An earlier version of this story stated that the distance between the mall and the site of the second strike was one kilometre when it is in fact roughly 0.5 kilometres The story has been updated to reflect this Eliot Higgins and Timmi Allen contributed to this report Ukrainian State Emergency Service firefighters work to take away debris at a shopping center burned after a rocket attack in Kremenchuk riverside city of Kremenchuk are reeling in the wake of a Russian airstrike that obliterated a shopping mall and killed at least 18 psychologists are working with families to help them through their grief and toward acceptance that they may never find their loved ones Oleksandr Baybuza shows a photo of his brother-in-law who was working in the shopping center during the Russian deadly rocket attack and is considered missing in Kremenchuk Oleksandr Baybuza tells about the Russian deadly rocket attack at a shopping center in Kremenchuk Baybuza said he is searching his brother-in-law Kostyantyn Vozniy who was working in the shopping center and is considered missing Ukraine (AP) — How do you grieve when there is no body to be found How do you move forward when the person you loved vanished into the dust in a matter of seconds These are some of the unthinkable questions many in Kremenchuk are now grappling with after a Russian airstrike obliterated a busy shopping mall Many hoped the war would not reach as far as their city checkpoints had been erected at the entrance to the town on a oil refinery on the outskirts of town a breezy city on the banks of the Dnipro river in central Ukraine hundreds of kilometers from the front lines the town offered them a sense of relative safety Then a Russian cruise missile crashed through the Amstor shopping mall igniting a fierce blaze that burned through the building and those trapped inside within minutes Some had just stopped by the mall on their way home from work But before they could register what was happening the fire inside so hot it melted the metal and glass Survivors told the AP that at the time of impact there were “hundreds” of people inside the building at least 20 other people have been reported missing local Telegram groups were filled with panicked messages asking for information about missing daughters Among those still searching for their relative is Oleksandr Baybuza whose brother-in-law Kostiantyn Voznyi was working inside Amstor at the time of the attack Baybuza told the AP that the family had no information about Voznyi’s whereabouts Voznyi had sent his wife and children to safety abroad unable to leave the country due to martial law and wound up working at an electronics store on the central aisle of the Amstor mall Oleksandr says witnesses saw him working there that afternoon The family has not been able to find him at any local hospitals DNA samples have been taken from Voznyi’s children and his father Fourteen emergency service psychologists are currently working at the blast site with families like Voznyi’s and with survivors The psychologists are up against a difficult task: The explosion was so powerful it is possible relatives may never find any trace of their loved ones a press officer for the State Emergency Services told the AP that alongside the identified dead investigators had found the fragments of 8 additional bodies “The police cannot say for sure how many (victims) there are So we are finding not the bodies but the fragments of bodies Now we are clearing at the very epicentre of the blast The psychologists are working to help families come to terms with the idea that they may not ever find their relatives “The main thing is: we do not give them extra hope We do not say that everything will be all right That your loved ones will be taken out of the rubble alive after several days “It’s important that they accept this reality as soon as possible” said another psychologist who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media “It’s better to release the emotions now rather than store them up for later.” Falieva says that the psychologists’ main job is to remain close to those who are suffering to help them through this deeply traumatic period She says that mostly people do not approach the psychologists to ask for help so it is their job to identify who needs support “We visually select people who need help most of all cries too much or behaves aggressively” says Falieva adding that she has helped people looking for their children former mall employees concerned about colleagues and anxious citizens alike several people still hoping for news of their loved ones stood by the wreckage of the mall A young woman sat cross-legged on the ground and wept Another woman was comforted by one of the psychologists appeared distressed as he stood staring at the ruins He had brought yellow flowers to lay at the nearby memorial I almost died” he said “I shouldn’t have come here it was a bad idea — I can’t even look at this… I want to kill these Russian scumbags.” Like many of the residents who now come to stare in silent disbelief at the wreckage of Amstor “I’ve been working for 20 years but this is the first experience of the kind Before we had crisis situations connected with nature Throughout these long days all of us are feeling this kind of shock must serve as a reminder that while the country is at war said that all citizens should expect incoming missiles “every minute” and “be ready” Psychologically it is difficult for many to accept the tragedy that struck their quiet “I still can’t believe the war came to our city Dmytro Lunin, Head of Poltava Regional Military Administration, reported on the attack on Telegram The strike was launched during the air alert in the morning which was signaled in most regions of the country The official noted that other infrastructure facilities were also attacked "Kremenchuk is again under enemy attack From 6 to 8 Russian missiles hit the refinery and other infrastructure facilities Stay in shelters!" the official wrote It is currently unknown whether there are human casualties Russia launched a new phase of the eight-year war against Ukraine – the full-scale offensive The enemy massively shell and bomb peaceful Ukrainian cities and the entire Ukrainian people are effectively resisting Russian troops and inflicting heavy losses on them While citing and using any materials on the Internet links to the website ukrinform.net not lower than the first paragraph are mandatory citing the translated materials of foreign media outlets is possible only if there is a link to the website ukrinform.net and the website of a foreign media outlet Materials marked as "Advertisement" or with a disclaimer reading "The material has been posted in accordance with Part 3 of Article 9 of the Law of Ukraine "On Advertising" No 1996 and the Law of Ukraine "On the Media" No 2023 and on the basis of an agreement/invoice Online media entity; Media identifier - R40-01421 Investigate Attack in Kremenchuk as Potential War Crime (Poltava, June 30, 2022) – Russian forces launched a missile which struck a shopping center in Kremenchuk, central Ukraine A Russian Defense Ministry official claimed that the shopping center had been closed at the time of the attack He also claimed that the fire that damaged the shopping center had spread from the detonation of Western-supplied munitions caused by Russian forces’ strike in an industrial complex adjacent to the shopping center “The Russian missile that directly hit an open and busy civilian shopping center on June 27 caused devastating loss of civilian life,” said Yulia Gorbunova senior Ukraine researcher at Human Rights Watch “The incident should be investigated as a potential war crime the International Criminal Court and other investigative bodies should.” Based on site investigations on June 28 and 29 Human Rights Watch could not identify any evidence to indicate the industrial complex was storing munitions although some of the shops closed after February 24 including people hospitalized with injuries Four people separately said that around 4 p.m. who works at a grocery kiosk opposite the shopping center said she heard the air raid siren around 4 p.m. and then heard a very loud explosion: “I screamed and jumped I felt sudden pain in my chest and stomach And saw huge black smoke over the shopping mall.” Footage recorded from a CCTV camera overlooking the industrial complex behind the shopping center captured the moment the first missile hit the shopping center The footage’s timestamp displays 3:51:54 p.m An adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy publicly shared the footage whose exact location was first geolocated by the investigative journalism group Bellingcat and verified by Human Rights Watch by matching landmarks in the video with satellite imagery Human Rights Watch cannot at this time verify or disprove whether the industrial site was ever used for military purposes and factory management granted researchers access to the complex said that the factory did not house any military vehicles or personnel and only produced machinery for concrete and asphalt production Researchers were allowed unhindered access to the facility They found no evidence of military vehicles the factory operated only part time due to disrupted supply lines and about 50 personnel remained when the missile hit The site’s security staff is not militarized and are equipped only with radio and flashlights Kremenchuk’s deputy mayor, Olha Usanova, and Oksana Korlyakova, head of the intensive care clinic said that only 5 of the 18 killed had been identified because the other bodies were so badly burned as to make visual identification impossible 57 people sought medical assistance at the clinic 25 of whom – 15 men and 10 women – required hospitalization One of them died shortly after arrival and five were in grave condition on June 28 The officials said that most people hospitalized had traumatic brain injuries and other injuries caused by primary and secondary blast fragmentation Medics sent one person with severe burn injuries to a specialized hospital A man hospitalized with head trauma and other injuries said he had been in the shopping center She was also trapped under concrete debris with her arm broken in three places: “As we were stumbling out [of the mall] she had to hold her arm with her other arm and we could see the bone protruding under the skin.” who worked for 10 years as a consultant at an electronic store in the center He said he heard an explosion followed by a “deafening crushing noise.” He remembered only being led outside by his colleagues some of them injured and bleeding: “A part of the wall was completely gone and we just walked through the opening to get outside.” an employee with another electronics store had been sitting outside the center with a co-worker waiting for the air raid siren to end: “I saw a yellow flash in front of my eyes hitting wooden pallets before losing consciousness.” When Petro regained consciousness he realized he had multiple cuts and blood gushing from his right arm He was hospitalized with a concussion and multiple bruises on his back and head His hand was visibly swollen and his back covered in bruises His co-worker was hospitalized with leg fractures An IT expert who was a kilometer from the shopping center when the strike hit went to the center when he heard the explosion and people being carried out with blood on their arms and head He said there was a lot of smoke and the smell of burning plastic was so overpowering that he could not breathe and had to leave after about 20 minutes Rescue workers continue to comb the site for survivors Human Rights Watch spoke with a family who said they called the morgue and every hospital in the city looking for their daughter Human Rights Watch analyzed satellite imagery collected before and after the attack A low-resolution image taken on June 27 at 11:18 a.m shows no damage to the shopping center or factory A high-resolution satellite image the following morning confirms that the attack hit at least two distinct areas reducing the shopping center to rubble and severely affecting the surrounding areas Several cars were destroyed and a section of the wall that surrounds the neighboring factory was damaged The crater at the industrial complex was caused by the second strike It hit the complex’s largest production warehouse and the greenhouse next to it The satellite image shows the crater and damage to several surrounding buildings The roof and northern façade of one of the buildings are severely damaged The Ukrainian air force command identified the weapons used by Russia in the strikes as KH-22 (X-22 in Cyrilic) cruise missiles Ukrainian authorities presented remnants they said had been recovered from the strike Human Rights Watch has not independently verified the weapons used in either strike The impact crater in the factory and the blast damage to the shopping center are consistent with the detonation of warheads weighing nearly 1,000 kilograms with large high-explosive payloads If Russian forces were targeting the industrial complex they had to or should have been aware of the large presence of civilians adjacent to their intended target They had an obligation to distinguish those civilians and the civilian shopping center from any potential military objective and to take all feasible precautions to minimize incidental loss of civilian life injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects This includes not conducting a strike where the foreseeable risk of civilian casualties and harm to civilian objects clearly exceeds any concrete military advantage anticipated Intentionally launching an attack where the loss of life or injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects would be clearly excessive in relation to the concrete and direct overall military advantage anticipated is a war crime The use of explosive weapons with wide-area effects in populated areas heightens concerns of unlawful These weapons can have a large destructive radius or deliver multiple munitions simultaneously The use of these weapons should be avoided in populated areas “The civilians in Kremenchuk who suffered such intense loss from the June 27 strike deserve justice,” Gorbunova said “There needs to be a thorough investigation and those responsible should be held to account.” Rights Violations against Migrants and Asylum Seekers at the New Eastern Border of the European Union Get updates on human rights issues from around the globe Human Rights Watch is a 501(C)(3) nonprofit registered in the US under EIN: 13-2875808 You don't have permission to access the page you requested What is this page?The website you are visiting is protected.For security reasons this page cannot be displayed Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine     During a working trip to the Poltava region the Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine discussed with the Head of the Poltava Regional Military Administration the issues of improving the quality of surface water in small rivers strengthening the banks of the Kremenchuk Reservoir the progress of creating waste processing infrastructure and providing the population with firewood where shoreline protection measures are needed Due to strong winds and fluctuations in water levels All necessary documentation has already been developed for the work The plans for this year are to carry out the work with co-financing from the State Water Agency and the regional budget We discussed options for attracting resources so that all work on the facility can be completed this year." – reported Ruslan the Archer Improving the quality of small rivers in the region Ruslan Strylets emphasized that all measures to improve the condition of small rivers in Poltava region are included in the River Basin Management Plans for the Middle and Lower Dnieper These include the modernization of treatment facilities Both international and local and state budget funds will be involved for their implementation Development of waste management infrastructure Active work continues in the region within the framework of the memorandum signed last year Communities are preparing land management documentation Ruslan Strylets emphasized the importance of developing and approving the Regional Waste Management Plan by the end of this year This is important in the context of attracting international investments to the development of waste management infrastructure in the Poltava region foresters sold 148 thousand cubic meters of firewood and plans are to sell 90 thousand by the end of the year Firewood can be easily ordered in the DrovaE online store tel.: +38 (044) 206 31 15Email: [email protected] tel.: +38 (044) 206 31 01Email: [email protected] Hotline “Ministry of Environment in touch” tel.: +38 (044) 206 33 02fax: +38 (044) 206 31 39Email:[email protected] Cabinet of Ministers of UkraineOffice of the President of Ukraine Since the beginning of 2024, this is already the fifth Branch that UKRSIBBANK BNP Paribas Group has opened in Ukraine. The new Branch is located in the center of the town at 40/2 Soborna Street Kremenchuk as a powerful industrial hub with numerous enterprises and more than 14000 subjects of entrepreneurial activity shows continuous growth The Branch offers a full range of banking services for individuals Customers can use the services of account maintenance The Branch is equipped with a modern ATM with cash deposit function and has a self-service area available 24/7 It should be pointed that the Branch is ready to switch to Premium-standard customer service The Branch is also prepared for eventual long-term blackouts: the Bank has installed a generator and has several communication channels the Branch is equipped for people with disabilities: it has a special lift and corresponding yellow marking The opening of the Branch is very important for us And today it is especially significant for a country that has been at war for more than 10 years and a full-scale invasion for more than two years develop the network and support the economy and our defenders Director of Retail Business of UKRSIBBANK BNP Paribas Group was also present at the event because it is part of the implementation of the Bank’s strategy in Ukraine it is a support to local communities and their entrepreneurship This is the fifth Branch in the new format since the start of the full-scale invasion It was built according to new standards and equipped for people with reduced mobility and people with disabilities Andrii Kashperuk noted that BNP Paribas has chosen for itself the support of the Ukrainian economy among all things and is doing everything for this last year UKRSIBBANK paid 5.1 billion hryvnias in taxes UKRSIBBANK BNP Paribas Group is a stable partner offering modern and reliable banking with the support of a leading European Group contributing to the strengthening of the Ukrainian economy and positively affecting the development of society The relevant statement was made by Poltava Regional Military Administration Head Dmytro Lunin on Telegram 18 people were killed in Russia’s missile attack A total of 36 people were listed as missing Those injured are provided with all necessary assistance,” Lunin wrote health workers and volunteers are involved in these efforts two Russian missiles hit Amstor Shopping Mall in Kremenchuk '+n.escapeExpression("function"==typeof(o=null!=(o=r(e,"eyebrowText")||(null!=l?r(l,"eyebrowText"):l))?o:n.hooks.helperMissing)?o.call(null!=l?l:n.nullContext||{},{name:"eyebrowText",hash:{},data:t,loc:{start:{line:28,column:63},end:{line:28,column:78}}}):o)+" \n '+(null!=(o=c(e,"if").call(r,null!=l?c(l,"cta2PreText"):l,{name:"if",hash:{},fn:n.program(32,t,0),inverse:n.noop,data:t,loc:{start:{line:63,column:20},end:{line:63,column:61}}}))?o:"")+"\n"+(null!=(o=(c(e,"ifAll")||l&&c(l,"ifAll")||n.hooks.helperMissing).call(r,null!=l?c(l,"cta2Text"):l,null!=l?c(l,"cta2Link"):l,{name:"ifAll",hash:{},fn:n.program(34,t,0),inverse:n.noop,data:t,loc:{start:{line:64,column:20},end:{line:70,column:30}}}))?o:"")+" Russia's attack on civilians at a shopping mall is cruel We stand in solidarity with the Ukrainian people.As demonstrated at the G7 Summit along with our allies and partners will continue to hold Russia accountable for such atrocities and support Ukraine’s defense Kremenchuk Oil Refinery was Ukraine’s primary large refinery before February 2022. Its sprawling site covers around 12 km2 and includes a thermal power plant. The refinery employed 3,000 people and, as it began operating in 1961, has significant legacy pollution. In recent years it had been operating at reduced capacity but grew in strategic importance after the closure of the Lysychansk Refinery in 2012 Between February 2022 and September 2023 eight discrete attacks have been reported at the refinery: the 2nd April, 24th April, 12th May, 18th June and 11th September 2022, and on the 16th February and 20th September 2023 The objects described in the first two attacks below went on to be damaged again during the subsequent attacks We are aware of further incidents after our September 2023 operational security cut-off We are tracking these incidents and hope to update this documentation when appropriate Satellite-only damage assessments are challenging for complex sites like refineries where intricate pipe networks can create visual objects and shadows that are difficult to interpret In this respect our assessment should be viewed as preliminary our assessment indicates that damage is distributed across the site Damage is visible to facilities including the power station electrical substations and buildings whose purpose we have been unable to determine At least 22 storage tanks have been destroyed or damaged whilst damage is visible to pipelines in at least four locations Some objects have been damaged on separate occasions including a building that was part of a substation and which was damaged in both April and June 2022 The attacks at Kremenchuk have caused air and soil pollution with the potential for contaminants to migrate into surface and ground waters Given the diversity of substances used and produced by the refinery it is impossible to precisely determine the pollutant releases The composition of the chemicals released also depends on whether they were emitted by spills or combustion and whether they were transported in the air or by water Petroleum products can be seen on the bare ground surrounding many of the damaged storage tanks Chemicals spilled onto bare ground may migrate from the release site and towards the cropland adjacent to the refinery satellite imagery reveals repairs to damaged buildings and the construction of new storage areas Debris and waste from the site will require management and disposal in an environmentally sound manner Return to the country map here Witness accounts and expert analysis discredit Moscow’s claim fire spread from arms cache to empty mall First-hand accounts from survivors and expert analysis have discredited Moscow’s account of the deadly missile strikes on a shopping mall in the Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk a spokesperson for Russia’s defence ministry said its military fired a “high-precision air attack at hangars where armament and munitions were stored” and the explosion of those weapon caches caused a fire in the nearby shopping centre which he said was “non-functioning” at the time information released by Ukrainian prosecutors and analysis by independent military experts point to three possible erroneous statements in that account – that the Ukrainian military was hiding weapons nearby 1:32Zelenskiy releases footage of 'deliberate' Russian strike on shopping mall – videoCCTV footage shows the first missile struck the mall at 3.51pm on Monday and a second shortly afterwards hit a factory that Moscow contends was storing western munitions Ukrainian police set up a table to collect twisted bits of a missile found inside It is believed to have been an X-22 Russian cruise missile fired from a Tu-22M long-range bomber View image in fullscreenUkrainian police display fragments of the X-22 missile found on the site Photograph: Alessio Mamo/GuardianSatellite images show the factory is 500 metres from the mall According to independent military experts and researchers from Molfar a global open source intelligence community the explosion there could not have provoked a fire strong enough to reach another building that far away View image in fullscreenSatellite images showing the distance between the mall and the factory Photograph: c/o BellingcatDuring a visit to the area between the mall and the factory little to no damage to buildings or roads was observed told the Guardian that the mall was open and busy when attacked Debris included the remains of workers’ badges and products sold that day at the supermarket View image in fullscreenA phone message allegedly sent by the local management of the mall on 23 June urging employees not to leave the shopping centre in case of air raid sirens.The Guardian has seen a phone message allegedly sent by the local management of the mall on 23 June urging employees not to leave the shopping centre in case of air raid sirens this shopping centre will not close during the air alarms,” the message stated “The shopping centre is open from 8am till 9pm No breaks.” At least five employees confirmed they had received the message a non-profit online journalism collective dedicated to war crime investigations collected receipts from purchases at the mall in recent days that were posted on social media by residents in Kremenchuk to show that the mall was indeed open Чек из магазина игрушек... за пару часов до 😡 pic.twitter.com/ZH5fUIFDcC Kremenchuk Road Machinery is a company producing equipment to repair and maintain roads or to repair vehicles used by construction workers View image in fullscreenA picture of the KredMash factory of Kremenchuk Road Machinery after the attack Photograph: c/o Ukraine’s State Emergency ServiceBellingcat said: “Although one report in 2014 stated that the factory had been used to repair three military vehicles this in itself does not prove that it was a storage site for US and European weapons and ammunition eight years later Corporate videos published on YouTube by specialised construction companies show the presence of cranes and other equipment in the factory which has corroborated the account of the Ukrainian authorities According to various accounts collected by the Guardian the plant had been temporarily closed because of the war It was being guarded by a custodian who finished his shift at 2pm it is easy to lose sight of the fact that there is a war still raging across the border in Ukraine Here is a dispatch from Kyiv.The morning of June 27 a popular electronics and home appliances store The shop was an anchor of the Amstor mall in the town of Kremenchuk specifically recalled the two Ukrainian soldiers who came in that afternoon The reason he remembered them wasn’t because they were in uniform—a practice that had already become commonplace four months into Russia’s full-scale war on neighboring Ukraine Ukrainian soldiers often remained in uniform when they were on leave from the front was that he and the pair had shared a hearty laugh that morning had asked Yakymenko if he could put some games on a new laptop they had just purchased they wanted to know if Yakymenko could download World of Tanks a multiplayer video game involving tank battles Your tanks out there aren’t enough?” And the three cracked up Yakymenko explained that it would take quite a while to download the game “I still remember how we laughed,” Yakymenko said in an interview months later “Most likely they were the last customers I helped that day.” the air-raid sirens went off across Kremenchuk Shoppers were instructed to leave Comfy and the other stores in the mall and many of the mall employees followed that directive a missile slammed into the appliance store the force of its blast ripping through much of the mall The air assault would leave at least 21 dead and over 70 injured The attack consisted of two Kh-22 missiles a Soviet-designed weapon developed to destroy ships and aircraft carriers According to the Ukrainian security service the missiles were launched by a Russian strategic bomber that took off from a military airfield a few hundred miles southwest of Moscow The missiles hit within seconds of each other striking the back of the Amstor mall—landing in the Comfy store’s rear storage area—and about 1,500 feet away at the neighboring Kredmash factory The shopping mall’s CCTV footage from earlier that morning had shown a typical summer day at the complex and the city’s residents still crowded its corridors busy keeping the bustling store in order; Artem Utorov on his way to grab a quick Americano at the coffee stall from Olga the baristal; Yakymennko rebooting his computer Rescuers clear rubbles from the missile strike on Amstor mall in Kremenchuk 2022.By GENYA SAVILOV/AFP/Getty Images.At the moment of the missile strike quick reality—mass murder in the middle of a regular working day having attacked a civilian mall instead of a military target were apparently sending a brutal message: now The Comfy outlet bore the brunt of the damage: 11 of the approximately 21 fatalities from the missile strike on the mall The assault on Kremenchuk was not the first time Russia had aimed a Kh-22 missile at civilian targets in Ukraine The prosecutor general’s office insisted that the same kind of missile was also used in at least three separate attacks the previous month: in Kramatorsk in a bombardment of a recreation center in Zatoka in the Odesa region and in the city of Lozova in the Kharkiv region a Kh-22 missile killed six people in Sarny this was a strategy that Vladimir Putin’s commanders had used in earlier conflicts—in Chechnya and Syria attempted to contact Timoshin about the allegations but did not receive a response The Kremlin has maintained that it has not targeted civilians According to international humanitarian law as defined in The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court noncombatant targets may well be considered a war crime if the actions are of a widespread and systematic nature they may also constitute crimes against humanity At the start of Russia’s invasion last year, Kremenchuk had been shelled several times, but only on the city's outskirts, where its oil refineries and power station were located the strikes had put the residents of the city an important industrial center in the Poltava area and Yakymenko remembered that there had been a steady flow of customers at Comfy A month shy of his second anniversary at the store He especially liked the collegial atmosphere among the staff the Comfy team was told that its sheltering point during air-raid alerts would be across the street in the basement of the Dniprovski Zori hotel followed social media posts on Telegram and relied on the local governor’s instructions about when and where to mobilize Yakymenko also paid attention to several Russian and pro-Russian bloggers on the app; he had seen their angry messages about how the Russian military should bomb Kremenchuk including the large truck manufacturing plants a Comfy store employee.By Maksym Savchenko The bloggers never mentioned anything about central Kremenchuk believed the heart of the city would ever become a target Kremenchuk got on with daily life while heeding the warnings when sirens went off Yakymenko has no recollection of how much time passed between his seeing the air-raid alert on his phone and realizing that he was on the ground covered in debris and wire desperately hoping to make out some light that would tell him where the sky was He feared the electrical cords near his head could electrocute him The pieces of what used to be his workstation were on top of him “I realized that I couldn’t see my hands or legs,” he recalled Yakymenko began crawling up from the rubble The store’s laptops were smashed and some of them he could see through the dark smoke around him He could hear a woman shouting for help but couldn’t make out who she was or where she was calling from “I realized we had to crawl out of there somehow and we started walking and he’s screaming.” Yakymenko tried to carry him through the blinding billows and I saw that he had a huge wound on his head.” The fires inside the mall were raging all around the two men Yakymenko resorted to dragging Krasyuk along the ground frantically trying to find any hint of light beyond him or above him—any illumination that might be able to direct him toward daylight and safety Yakymenko managed to drag Krasyuk and himself far enough outside the hulking tangle of the burning mall to a spot where it was possible to get fresh air As Yakymenko crawled out of the smoke and fire he saw someone in a Comfy employee T-shirt running toward the mall entrance A camera happened to be trained on the mall complex when the missile struck. The shocking footage captures the missile’s penetration records a mother shielding her young son after the blast and a panicked sprint through the parking lot toward the mall along with the harrowing aftermath: local residents amid the broken glass and collapsed walls and ceiling.) With global focus suddenly on a Ukrainian city and a civilian population far from the battlefield the Russian defense ministry went on the defensive had been “non-functioning” at the time of the strike Witnesses interviewed for this article confirmed that the Amstor mall had remained open every day since the war commenced in February 2022 or for other investigations related to the Kremenchuk attack remembered seeing a Ukrainian military vehicle in or around the mall “There is a myth that there was military equipment in Amstor,” said Artyom Utorov a longtime Comfy store employee who was caught in the blast I just know this Amstor completely from the inside out and I know that it is physically impossible to get even one military vehicle in there.” Once the mall displayed a Daewoo car as part of a marketing campaign but even at its size it was difficult to maneuver it in and out of the mall had gotten the warning to head to the basement of the hotel across the street he was descending the stairs to the underground shelter The first explosion was so strong that Shamrai and some of the others lost their footing or were hurled to the ground by the blast’s impact Then Shamrai heard someone run down into the shelter screaming that a missile had struck Amstor Shamrai and his companions rushed up the stairs and into the streets People were stumbling out of the mall entrance Shamrai feared some of his colleagues were still stuck inside the burning mall hoping to make his way into the bombed-out facility and find them to use the weak light on his iPhone to penetrate the smoke that had enveloped the building He approached a policeman to ask for a flashlight that by the time Shamrai got to the mall entrance and pressed it to his nose and mouth to filter out some of the smoke Several other Comfy employees were starting to gather on the spot It was then that Yakymenko emerged from the rubble of the mall having managed to bring the injured and fallen Krasyuk to the brink of the exit Others came to Krasyuk’s aid and an ambulance shuttled him away Though Yakymenko had been in the store when the missile hit His coworkers spun him around to check his body for injuries “It was very hard for him to speak,” Shamrai said An aerial view of the destroyed shopping mall.By Metin Aktas/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images.The group of Comfy employees began phoning their colleagues trying to get a head count of who was safe Many of the calls went unanswered; some were unable to connect due to signal problems They realized that at least 14 coworkers were unaccounted for The group tried to establish where Musiyenko was “I can’t see anything,” Musiyenko said into the phone With the front entrance still a wall of fire and smoke Shamrai and another Comfy colleague decided to go around the back of the mall near the loading dock ramps They realized it was a bad idea as soon as they got there “Even the asphalt was on fire,” Shamrai recalled He kept Musiyenko on the line for 10 minutes urging him to keep talking and not hang up as colleagues and rescue workers searched for him his memory of the day had completely vanished was with his wife and three-year-old son at the nearby Peace Park The recreation area has a man-made pond with ducks and is a favorite playground for the children of Kremenchuk The park is located on the spot where military leader Grigory Potemkin created a large city greenery in the 1870s in preparation for a visit from Tsarina Catherine the Great Some of the oak trees planted at the time still stand to this day Henhalo and his family got in their car and headed for the Amstor mall to go shopping neither Henhalo nor his wife heard the air-raid alert as they approached the mall they saw mall workers gathering in the parking lot Henhalo rushed his wife and son back to the car which he drove to a parking lot far from the mall turning on his cell phone camera as he approached the mall Upon entering the complex he was shocked by the clouds of black smoke and the sight of the employees and customers by the image of a little girl who was drenched in blood—either from her own wounds or those of her parents “I was worried about the children the most,” the young father remembered The camera on Henhalo’s phone was still rolling as he got farther inside the burning mall He estimated that he made at least 10 trips in and out of the damaged facility trying to find and help victims who were injured or disoriented captured the screams and cries of those trapped inside or stumbling toward the exit the fires were burning and the shouting and screaming were constant Here was an instance—as part of a purported pattern of other such attacks that gained momentum in May 2022—in which the Russian military used Kh-22 missiles to attack civilian targets and infrastructure In its note of suspicion against the Russian Air Force commander investigators describe at least 10 incidents in which the Kremlin deployed such weaponry Workers clearing the rubble of the Amstor mall.By Peter Ruzavin have little time to focus on issues such as how their testimonies might be used in international tribunals they are supporting the war effort—and getting on with their lives the Comfy store reopened in a new location about half a mile from the twisted metal ruins of the mall There were advantages to being caught up in the daily grind Most notably: The Comfy staff remained extremely close a family brought even closer by the tragedy While the physical scars had begun to heal—and the mental stresses remain— he and many in Kremenchuk contend they are diving back into their lives and their work even as they are focused on defeating the Russians and ending the war life still seems pretty normal,” he said as he finished helping a customer with her new iPhone purchase and looked out at the store’s weekend shopping crowd How Miriam Adelson Went From Big MAGA Winner to Casino Loser in Trump’s First 100 Days Trump’s Lies Are Finally Catching Up to Him The UK Has Found Another Reason to Be Mad at Meghan Markle “It’s About Him”: How Trump Is Perverting the Presidential Photo Stream The Ballad of Bill Belichick and Jordon Hudson The Truth Underlying Pete Hegseth’s Job Security Why Are Americans So Obsessed With Protein How Sebastian Stan Became Hollywood’s Most Daring Shape-Shifter Every Quentin Tarantino Movie Meet Elon Musk’s 14 Children and Their Mothers (Whom We Know of) From the Archive: Sinatra and the Mob Scores of people injured and at least 40 feared missing after strike in central city of Kremenchuk A Russian missile hit a crowded shopping centre in the central Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk on Monday said more than 1,000 people were inside the building at the time of the strike Images from the scene showed giant plumes of black smoke and flames with emergency crews rushing in to search for victims and put out fires the head of Ukraine’s state emergency service said at 2am local time on Tuesday: “We continue to work at the site of the rocket attack on the shopping centre in Kremenchuk The main tasks currently performed by rescuers are to carry out rescue operations Ukrainian war crimes prosecutors told the Guardian earlier that 14 bodies had been found in the ruins and one person died from their wounds in hospital At least 40 missing persons reports had been submitted by locals searching for loved ones who had gone missing in the building it ignited a massive fire that took 300 emergency workers more than four hours to extinguish from the Kremenchuk district prosecutor’s office said cranes would be brought in on Tuesday to help lift the collapsed roof of the shopping centre At the current moment 14 bodies were found here on the site and another one died in the hospital.” the head of communications of Poltava region State Emergency Service said the exact number of casualties remained unclear and that “There might be survivors.” emergency workers and soldiers combed through blackened debris and twisted metal The attack came on the day of a G7 meeting in Germany where leaders discussed ways to punish Moscow for its invasion and pledged to stand with Ukraine “for as long as it takes” the leaders of the G7 said Vladimir Putin’s attacks aimed at civilians were a “war crime” solemnly condemn the abominable attack on a shopping mall in Kremenchuk “We stand united with Ukraine in mourning the innocent victims of this brutal attack Indiscriminate attacks on innocent civilians constitute a war crime Russian president Putin and those responsible will be held to account we underlined our unwavering support for Ukraine in the face of the Russian aggression an unjustified war of choice that has been raging for 124 days.” They said they would “continue to provide financial humanitarian as well as military support for Ukraine “We will not rest until Russia ends its cruel and senseless war on Ukraine.” Russia had stepped up its missile strikes on Ukraine as the summit came closer on Sunday and launching 20 rockets from Belarusian territory raising worries in Ukraine that Moscow is aiming to drag its key ally Belarus into the conflict Zelenskiy said on Telegram that the number of victims was “unimaginable” He wrote: “The occupiers fired missiles at the shopping centre where there were more than a thousand civilians Russia continues to take out its impotence on ordinary citizens It is useless to hope for decency and humanity from Russia.” A rescue operation was under way and nine of the wounded were in a serious condition the deputy head of the presidential office Ukraine’s air force command said in a statement that Russia hit the mall with two X-22 cruise missiles that were fired by an unspecified number of Tu-22M long-range bombers the planes fired their rockets while in the sky over the Kursk region Commenting on the strike in his nightly video address Zelenskiy called Russia “the largest terrorist organisation in the world” He said: “Everyone in the world should know that buying or transporting Russian oil paying taxes and duties to the Russian state is giving money to terrorists.” similarly called the attack an “act of terrorism against civilians,” noting there was no military target nearby that Russia could have been aiming at Kremenchuk is the site of Ukraine’s biggest oil refinery and stands on the banks of the Dnieper River The city serves as the administrative centre of the Kremenchuk district in Poltava oblast There was no immediate comment from the Kremlin which denies deliberately targeting civilians claimed without providing evidence that reports of the attack had “many inconsistencies” He said: “We have to wait for what our ministry of defence says but there are already too many conspicuous inconsistencies This is exactly what the Kyiv regime needs to keep the focus on Ukraine before the Nato summit.” Boris Johnson said the Russian attack on Kremenchuk would strengthen the resolve of G7 leaders A UK government source said that when Johnson heard about the Kyiv strike he told fellow leaders it was “stupid of Putin to do something like that when all of us are in the same place because it is only going to make us feel more resolute and united.” Russian shelling on Monday of a residential area in Ukraine’s second largest city Forces fighting for Russia are also mounting an all-out assault on the last Ukrainian stronghold in the eastern Luhansk region, where Russian troops hope to cut off the city of Lysychansk which along with Donetsk makes up the Donbas region Russia’s Interfax news agency and pro-Russia separatist fighters said Russian troops had entered Lysychansk on Saturday after Ukrainian forces were ordered to withdraw from Sievierodonetsk The claim could not be independently verified and there was no immediate comment from the Ukrainian side said on Facebook that Russian and separatist fighters were trying to blockade Lysychansk from the south and that due to heavy bombardments the city “is almost unrecognisable” Haidai also said that at least eight civilians were killed in a Russian missile attack on Lysychansk The roots of Russia's invasion of Ukraine go back decades and run deep The current conflict is more than one country fighting to take over another; it is — in the words of one U.S official — a shift in "the world order."Here are some helpful stories to make sense of it all Workers clean up wreckage at the Amstor Mall in Kremenchuk after the building was hit by a Russian cruise missile Ukraine — It was a hot summer afternoon in this city in central Ukraine the kind of day Ukrainians dream of in the depths of winter Teenagers in cut-off jeans made plans to gather at the mall Ihor Mykhaylov and his wife were waiting for a bus in front of the Amstor shopping mall "We decided to go into the mall to buy some water," Mykhaylov says Soviet-era missile crashed into the complex Mykhaylov's wife and 20 other people were killed and the Amstor Mall joined more than two dozen other shopping centers that Russian forces have destroyed in more than four months of their full-scale invasion of Ukraine I realized I'd lost my arm," Mykhaylov says about regaining consciousness on the floor of the mall his right arm is amputated just below the elbow He remembers fire was spreading through the mall "I realized I had to crawl out of there," he says The 53-year-old used to work in construction Mykhaylov was one of nearly 60 people seriously injured by the Russian missile strike on the Amstor Mall The hit on the mall was followed moments later by an explosion roughly 500 yards away a second Russian missile smashed into the grounds of a factory behind the shopping complex Workers at the Kredmash factory walk past the portion of the plant that was hit by a missile that landed moments after a missile hit a nearby shopping mall Viktor Shybko, the deputy head of Kredmash points to a muddy crater on the edge of the industrial compound where the missile struck It hit the Kredmash compound 20 minutes after most workers had left for the day damaged one assembly line and blew out a lot of windows Russian officials have made conflicting and at times ridiculously false claims about the airstrikes that hit Kredmash and the Amstor Mall. Those assertions include that the shopping mall was empty and that the casualties were staged. Another claim is that Russia only targeted the factory where it alleged the Ukrainian army was hiding weapons saying he heard this rumor too — from Russian media Workers at the Kredmash factory put plastic over windows blown out by the explosion of a Russian cruise missile "You can see that all of our storage is open," he says as he walks across through the aging industrial compound "So there's no place to keep any type of military machines here." Yet Kredmash is a massive industrial complex The compound is a collection of warehouses and metal working factories with direct access to rail lines and truck loading docks It certainly has the potential to hide weapons hit nearly a quarter-mile apart on either side of the complex says the plant appears to have been the intended target Russia is desperately trying to hit Western military supplies that are moving across Ukraine to the front lines in the east Russian forces "have not been able to in any way effectively disrupt the logistical network inside Ukraine" of ammunition and equipment, says Hodges, who's now with the Center for European Policy Analysis He says Russia can't strike moving trains or trucks inside Ukraine so it's going after suspected weapons warehouses and transfer points But even hitting those is difficult because Moscow has used up most of its precision missiles The Russians are now using missiles built 40 years ago that lack sophisticated targeting systems And making those weapons even less accurate they're firing them from hundreds of miles away "The Russian air force does not even come into Ukrainian airspace because there they have failed to achieve air superiority," Hodges says "They're terrified of the Ukrainian air force and air defenses So they stay in the airspace over Belarus or Russia to launch these missiles into their targets." If they end up killing innocent bystanders, Hodges says, this is not a problem for commanders in the Russian military. He says not only is no one going to get in trouble for it, the collateral damage actually plays into the scorched earth policy the Russian military used in Mariupol and many other parts of Ukraine The Russians try to terrify the local population You hit a shopping mall at peak hours," he says Despite regularly proclaiming that it does not attack civilian targets Russia has obliterated apartment buildings across the country in addition to blowing up shopping malls in Ukraine United Nations human rights experts have counted almost 5,000 civilians killed and more than 6,000 injured since the start of the war in February Even if these recent strikes on civilians were accidents, Oleksandra Matviichuk, the head of the Center for Civil Liberties Ukraine, says they are war crimes. It doesn't matter, she says even if President Vladimir Putin and Russian military commanders claim they were aiming for military targets "You have always to evaluate the possible damage for civilians even when you try to hit a military object," she says Russia routinely isn't doing that evaluation And she says this is not new for the Russian military "They've enjoyed impunity for decades," she says "They committed the same [attacks on civilians] in Georgia and Moldova They really think that they can do whatever they want and they can say whatever they want." says he expects Russian strikes on civilians to continue as military leaders in Moscow face dogged Ukrainian resistance on the front lines and the Kremlin grows more frustrated with what it had expected to be a quick war Become an NPR sponsor Click here to see ISW's interactive map of the Russian invasion of Ukraine This map is updated daily alongside the static maps present in this report A Russian missile strike hit a shopping mall in a residential area of Kremenchuk likely killing many civilians.[1] Ukrainian sources stated that over 1,000 civilians were inside the mall at the time of the strike and officials are still clarifying the number of casualties.[2] The Kremenchuk strike follows a wider intensification of Russian missile strikes against Ukrainian infrastructure and civilian targets in recent days Advisor to the Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs Vadym Denisenko stated on June 26 that Russian forces have begun a campaign of massive and largely indiscriminate missile strikes against Ukrainian cities which echoes statements made by an unnamed US defense official on June 27 that Russian forces are increasingly relying on artillery and missile strikes to advance operations in Ukraine.[3] As Russian forces continue to burn through their supply of high-precision weaponry such attacks that cause substantial collateral civilian damage will likely escalate.[4] Russian military authorities continue to seek ways to replenish their increasingly exhausted force capabilities without announcing general mobilization An unnamed senior US defense official stated on June 27 that Russian forces are likely running low on senior military leaders and are relying more heavily on retired officers and reserves to replace officer casualties.[5] The UK Ministry of Defense similarly reported that Russian forces will likely rely heavily on reserve echelons namely the Combat Army Reserve (BARS) and Human Mobilization Resource in order to galvanize volunteer support and fill out the third battalion tactical group (BTG) within regular (and depleted) brigades.[6] As ISW has previously assessed such reserves are unlikely to provide Russian forces with meaningful regeneration of force capabilities We do not report in detail on Russian war crimes because those activities are well-covered in Western media and do not directly affect the military operations we are assessing and forecasting We will continue to evaluate and report on the effects of these criminal activities on the Ukrainian military and population and specifically on combat in Ukrainian urban areas We utterly condemn these Russian violations of the laws of armed conflict and humanity even though we do not describe them in these reports Luhansk Oblasts (Russian objective: Encircle Ukrainian forces in Eastern Ukraine and capture the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas) Click here to enlarge the map Click here to enlarge the map Russian forces made marginal advances southwest of Lysychansk on June 27 but have not yet entirely severed Ukrainian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) to the city situated just south of the Lysychansk Gelatin Plant Luhansk Oblast Administration Head Serhiy Haidai called on Lysychansk residents to evacuate from the city indicating Ukrainian forces retain control of at least some GLOCs to the city.[9] Russian Telegram channels continue to claim that Russian forces have established “fire control” (likely meaning successfully interdicting Ukrainian movement) along Ukrainian GLOCs to Lysychansk on the Siversk-Bilohorivka road Ukrainian forces continued to resist Russian advances towards the T1302 to the east of Bakhmut on June 27 The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful reconnaissance-in-force attempts around Yakovlivka all along the T1302 highway within 30 km northeast of Bakhmut.[11] Russian forces continued to shell Ukrainian positions in Bilohorivka also likely in an effort to sever the GLOC by forcing Ukrainian forces out of settlements along the T1302.[12] Russian and Ukrainian sources reported ongoing fighting in Klynove where Russian forces are attempting to gain a foothold on the E40 highway to Slovyansk.[13] Ukrainian forces reportedly repulsed Russian assaults on Klynove but confirmed that Russian forces continued advancing in settlements just west of the E40.[14] Ukrainian forces also likely used recently US-provided HIMARS rocket artillery systems to strike a Russian ammunition depot approximately 60 km east in Russian-controlled territory in Luhansk Oblast.[15]  Russian forces conducted unsuccessful offensive operations north of Slovyansk on June 27 Kharkiv Oblast Administration Head Oleg Synegubov reported that Ukrainian forces resisted Russian attacks in Mazanivka and Dolyna along the E40.[16] Russian offensive operations have been largely stalled around the Izyum axis since Russian shifted their focus to secure the Severodonetsk-Lysychansk area The UK Defense Ministry noted that heavy shelling around Izyum may indicate Russian attempts to “regain momentum” along this axis but Russian forces will likely need to deprioritize advances in Luhansk Oblast to resume offensive operations north of Slovyansk.[17] Russian forces did not attempt to launch a ground assault on settlements in the Slovyansk or Siversk areas from Lyman.[18]  Supporting Effort #1—Kharkiv City (Russian objective: Withdraw forces to the north and defend ground lines of communication (GLOCs) to Izyum) Click here to enlarge the map Russian forces conducted localized but unsuccessful assaults on settlements northwest and southeast of Kharkiv City Kharkiv Oblast Administration Head Oleg Synegubov reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful attacks against Pytomnyk and Dementiivka both situated along the E105 Kharkiv-Belgorod City highway.[19] The Ukrainian General Staff also reported that Ukrainian forces repulsed Russian attacks in Dovhalivka and Zalyman approximately 90km southeast of Kharkiv City in the direction of Izyum.[20] Russian forces also reportedly continued remote mining and radio-technical reconnaissance in settlements around Kharkiv City likely in an effort to disrupt any attempted Ukrainian counterattacks.[21] Former Russian Federal Security Service officer and milblogger Igor Girkin (Strelkov) claimed that Russian forces presently lack the strength or motivation to launch offensive operations in northern and central Kharkiv Oblast but are likely to continue defending occupied positions as a “springboard” for potential future attacks against Kharkiv City.[22]  Supporting Effort #2—Southern Axis (Objective: Defend Kherson and Zaporizhia Oblasts against Ukrainian counterattacks) Click here to enlarge the map. Russian forces conducted air strikes against Ukrainian positions in Kherson Oblast, artillery strikes against various locations in Dnipropetrovsk and Mykolaiv Oblasts, and a missile attack against residential infrastructure in Odesa Oblast.[27] Ukrainian forces continued strikes on the Russian grouping in Snake Island, likely in order to complicate Russian attempts to consolidate their presence in and control of the northwestern Black Sea.[28] Activity in Russian-occupied Areas (Russian objective: consolidate administrative control of occupied areas; set conditions for potential annexation into the Russian Federation or some other future political arrangement of Moscow’s choosing) [1] RU forces launched a missile strike on a shopping center IVO Kremenchuk on JUN 27 https://t.me/V_Zelenskiy_official/2255; https://t.me/stranaua/49204; https://t.me/stranaua/49202; https://t.me/stranaua/49195 https://t.me/stranaua/49201; https://t.me/stranaua/49193 https://t.me/stranaua/49194; https://t.me/stranaua/49189; https://t.me/stranaua/49182; https://t.me/spravdi/11759; https://t.me/DMYTROLUNIN/2699; https://t.me/luhanskaVTSA/3825; https://t.me/luhanskaVTSA/3824 [2] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/russian-missiles-hit-kremenchuk-shopping-center-1000-civilians-ukraine-rcna35482; https://t.me/V_Zelenskiy_official/2255; https://t.me/DMYTROLUNIN/2699 [3] https://t.me/stranaua/49100; https://ru.espreso dot tv/rossiyane-izmenili-strategiyu-obstrelov-i-massovo-obstrelivayut-ukrainskie-goroda-sovetnik-ministra-mvd-denisenko; https://twitter.com/JackDetsch/status/1541434677860384771 [4] https://t.me/stranaua/49100; https://ru.espreso dot tv/rossiyane-izmenili-strategiyu-obstrelov-i-massovo-obstrelivayut-ukrainskie-goroda-sovetnik-ministra-mvd-denisenko   [5] https://twitter.com/JackDetsch/status/1541433519565639683 [6] https://twitter.com/DefenceHQ/status/1541295716823441408/photo/1 [7] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl; https://t.me/luhanskaVTSA/3787?single [8] https://t.me/rybar/34452; https://twitter.com/GeoConfirmed/status/1541442993718280194; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100; https://t.me/mod_russia/17201 [10] https://t.me/rybar/34452; https://t.me/strelkovii/2804 [11]https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl;  https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl [12]https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl [13] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl; https://t.me/readovkanews/37566 [14] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100 [16] https://t.me/synegubov/3502; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl [17] https://twitter.com/DefenceHQ/status/1541295716823441408/photo/1 [18]https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100 [20] https://twitter.com/GirkinGirkin/status/1541453286577999872?cxt=HHwWgMC4hZzmq-QqAAAA; https://twitter.com/GirkinGirkin/status/1541452411885199362?cxt=HHwWhICxiaezq-QqAAAA; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid09QA4MGcSeuiyUxt2YUgihsx7mqj1PhiDWBq31NoG4n94G2Q2FMzFfi4gG5CGEtksl [21]https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl; https://t.me/rybar/34446; https://t.me/synegubov/3502; https://t.me/spravdi/11705 [23] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100; https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/pfbid0QSxsizTGBYptAmPn8pF3emh7MVWL8XZv95jFopTmEtUsVb3jV5qYfXdtL7EG3tNVl; https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2830474810429777; https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=568886191484490 [24] https://twitter.com/JackDetsch/status/1541430127237668867; https://www dot pravda.com.ua/rus/news/2022/06/27/7354968/; https://www dot unian.net/war/ukrainskie-voennye-prodolzhayut-medlenno-ottesnyat-vraga-na-yuge-gumenyuk-novosti-vtorzheniya-rossii-na-ukrainu-11881407.html; https://armyinform dot com.ua/2022/06/27/bryfing-nachalnyka-obyednanogo-koordynaczijnogo-presczentru-syl-oborony-pivdnya-ukrayiny/ [25] https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=568886191484490 [26] https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua/posts/349573180689100 [27] https://t.me/spravdi/11705; https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2830474810429777; https://twitter.com/TWMCLtd/status/1541195872956026880; https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=568886191484490 [28] https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2830474810429777; https://armyinform dot com.ua/2022/06/27/zmiyinyj-ukrayinski-vijskovi-zavdaly-po-ostrovu-ponad-10-vluchnyh-urazhen/; https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=619914819117980; https://twitter.com/RALee85/status/1541389394573201409 [29] https://t.me/stranaua/49090 ; https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=pfbid0oNbbNUMM5gaAoar4YJkrmth6L2PPrXsczvHeJmBSXfoiuoktmdqCxxvBunoSXWAwl&id=100028374940771 [30] https://t.me/stranaua/49090 ; https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=pfbid0oNbbNUMM5gaAoar4YJkrmth6L2PPrXsczvHeJmBSXfoiuoktmdqCxxvBunoSXWAwl&id=100028374940771 [31] https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2830474810429777 Reporting by Leigh Thomas; Editing by Leslie Adler Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab , opens new tab Browse an unrivalled portfolio of real-time and historical market data and insights from worldwide sources and experts. , opens new tabScreen for heightened risk individual and entities globally to help uncover hidden risks in business relationships and human networks. © 2025 Reuters. All rights reserved Ukraine — The death toll has climbed to 21 people in a Russian strike on a crowded shopping mall in the central Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk Authorities say up to 1,000 people were inside the mall in the afternoon of June 27 when a missile struck the Amstor mall In addition to the fatalities, 59 people were wounded, 25 of them hospitalized, and authorities have received 40 reports from relatives of people still missing, presidential adviser Kyrylo Tymoshenko previously said on the Telegram social media app Video from the scene showed huge clouds of black smoke and flame billowing from mall Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called the Russian state "the largest terrorism organization in the world" in a daily video address posted after the attack "Only totally insane terrorists who have no place on Earth would strike such an object," Zelenskyy said to give Ukraine more advanced anti-aircraft and missile defense systems to guard against Russian air attacks Another missile hit a closed factory nearby Russia's government claimed the shopping center caught fire after Russia struck a nearby weapons depot. On Twitter, Russia's ambassador to the United Nations suggested Ukraine had fabricated the attack Ukrainian officials reject these claims as false Russia has carried out numerous bombardments of Ukrainian population centers attacks Moscow says are aimed at military installations but often hit purely civilian targets instead Russia’s bombing of a shopping centre in Kremenchuk is an abomination. We share the pain of the victims’ families, and the anger in the face of such an atrocity. The Russian people have to see the truth:pic.twitter.com/7drortbGSE The mall strike came during a particularly bloody week in Ukraine as Russia escalated cruise missile strikes even in parts of the country that had been relatively shielded from fighting since Russia invaded in February Notifications can be managed in browser preferences. The formerly busy shopping centre is now a shell of itself I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our Privacy notice As rescuers dig for survivors in the bombarded Kremenchuk shopping centre terrified shoppers recall the moment missiles landed on the mall as more than 1,000 people were inside the central Ukrainian city had a population of 217,000 and was an important industrial site The shopping centre was a busy and popular location in the heart of the city Today it’s a shell of itself. According to the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, 60 per cent of the shopping centre was damaged leaving 18 dead, 59 injured and 31 people still missing after the Monday afternoon strike. Images of the complex before the attack show a large modern mall, but photos coming from the aftermath show what survivors have described as “hell.” One patient in Kremenchuk hospital's general ward, Ludmyla Mykhailets, 43, said she was shopping at an electronics store with her husband, Mykola, when the blast threw her into the air. “I flew head first and splinters hit my body. The whole place was collapsing. Then I landed on the floor and I don’t know if I was conscious or unconscious,” she said, adding she had broken her arm and split her head open. “It was hell,” added Mykola, 45, blood seeping through a bandage wrapped around his head. A 21-year-old, Yulia who started working at the mall on the day of the attack was covered with deep cuts at the hospital. Outside the hospital, a small group of mall workers were filled with worry and grief, but also relief. Hearing an air-raid siren, they had made their way to a nearby basement when the missiles struck, said Roman, 28, who asked to be identified by only one name. He added that many others had stayed inside as the mall’s management had three days ago allowed shops to remain open during air raid sirens. Many Ukrainians have stopped reacting to the now regular warning sirens as strikes have been occurring less frequently outside of Ukraine's battle-torn east. Back in the intensive-care ward, Yulia, a 21-year-old woman covered with deep cuts, said Monday was her first day working in one of the stores in the mall. Russia on Tuesday denied hitting a shopping mall in the Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk with missiles, saying that it had struck a nearby depot of U.S. and European arms triggering an explosion which ignited a fire in the mall. “In Kremenchuk, Russian forces struck a weapons depot storing arms received from the United States and Europe with high-precision air-based weapons,” Russia’s defence ministry said in a daily statement on the war. “The detonation of stored ammunition for western weapons caused a fire in a non-functioning shopping centre located next to the depot,” it added. Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies People fear for loved ones a day after shopping centre in Ukrainian city hit by two Russian missiles Twenty-four hours after two Russian X-22 cruise missiles hit a crowded shopping centre in Kremenchuk small plumes of black smoke could still be seen rising from the smoking ruins Dozens of people who feared their loved ones had been inside the building when the deadly explosions ripped through it looked on in grim silence as a giant crane removed sections of the collapsed roof exposing blackened debris and twisted metal underneath rescue workers had placed a stretcher where they carefully placed fragments of charred human remains found in the rubble Authorities estimate there were between 200 and 1,000 people inside at the time of the attack Many managed to flee to a nearby bomb shelter when they heard the air raid sirens Others did not make it in time and remained trapped inside At least 18 people were killed and 21 are still missing it ignited a huge fire that took 300 emergency workers more than four hours to extinguish said members of his team had recovered dozens of body fragments “We need to carry out DNA tests to identify them,” Lukash said “What concerns us are the 21 missing persons reports which had been submitted by locals searching for loved ones who had gone missing in the building.” View image in fullscreenRescue services worked for more than 20 hours to recover bodies in the hope of finding survivors Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The GuardianFor more than 20 hours military personnel firefighters and police have been working non-stop to recover bodies from the rubble in the hope of finding survivors “We pulled out several bodies but there are definitely more trapped under the rubble,” said Oleksii “I left the building two minutes before the explosion,” said Yevhenia Semyonova a shop assistant at a sportswear outlet inside the mall “My colleagues who are working in bigger stores had to wait for the customers to get out before they could leave We were lucky because there were no customers in our store during the alarm all the shops stopped working during air sirens But eventually people got used to it and started ignoring the sirens Unfortunately that’s what happened yesterday too A lot of people I know and some friends are still missing.” Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The GuardianThe Guardian has seen a phone message allegedly sent by the local management of the mall on 23 June urging employees not to leave the shopping centre when air raid sirens go off this shopping centre will not close during the air alarms,” reads the message “The shopping centre works from 8am till 9pm At least five employees confirmed they had received the message A woman who worked in the supermarket inside the mall said she managed to escape immediately after the explosion “Usually on Mondays I was forced to take my little daughter to work because the kindergarten was closed But luckily yesterday I found someone to take care of her while I was working was supposed to open her store today at 10am tears streaming down her face as she surveyed the rubble “I had coffee with my colleagues here yesterday morning There are some people I know who are missing There was a huge toy store inside the mall the burned-out building was illuminated by floodlights as emergency workers and soldiers combed through the rubble and relatives of those missing waited across the street “The relatives are confused and anxious,” said Yulia Fesieieva a senior psychologist of Poltava regional state emergency service “We observe and single out people who are visibly in distress We approach them and introduce ourselves and try to help them View image in fullscreenWorried relatives who fear loved ones had been inside the building wait across the street from the destroyed shopping centre Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The GuardianShe continued: “There was a young man who was shaking He was trying to call his wife who had left the house with her best friend to buy food for their pet but she didn’t pick up his wife left the building 10 minutes before the attack decided to stay behind and continue shopping She wasn’t able to leave the building before the explosion and died in an intensive care unit.” with two X-22 cruise missiles that were fired from Tu-22M long-range bombers the planes fired their rockets while in the sky over the Kursk region of Russia Volodymyr Zelenskiy called Russia “the largest terrorist organisation in the world” Russia’s ministry of defence claimed the fire in the shopping mall in Kremenchuk was caused by “the detonation of stored ammunition for western weapons” No evidence was offered to back up the claim Ukrainian police set up a table where they placed twisted bits of metal believed to be from the missiles View image in fullscreenVolodymyr Vasylenko: ‘I don’t know how and why we deserve this.’ Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The GuardianVolodymyr Vasylenko arrived on Tuesday morning at the site of the attack to leave some flowers among the rubble “I don’t know how and why we deserve this,” he said Maybe this was God’s plan so we could finally get the weapons we needed there is nothing we can do but to continue doing what one can do.” The reported attack comes just days before Russia's Victory Day parade and three-day "truce." MPs will be able to ask questions and learn more about the details of the agreement in meetings with Economy Minister Yulia Svyrydenko May 6-7 MP Serhii Sobolev told the news outlet Suspilne The ratification vote is scheduled for May 8 Attacks against the border villages of Bilopillia and Vorozhba damaged civilian infrastructure and triggered emergency evacuations the regional military administration reported "I look forward to working with President Erdogan on getting the ridiculous war between Russia and Ukraine ended — now!" U.S Putin's Victory Day truce "doesn't sound like much if you know where we started from," Trump told reporters at the White House on May 5 Far-right Euroskeptic candidate George Simion head of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) Bucharest Mayor Nicusor Dan placed second with 20.99% of the vote and the candidate from the ruling coalition "It requires the continuation of contacts between Moscow and Washington which have been launched and are now ongoing," Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said set to operate within the Council of Europe will focus on Russia's political and military leaders up to 20 Russian soldiers were killed and their equipment destroyed The move represents an apparent violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions passed in the wake of North Korea's intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) tests "We are ready to deepen our contribution to the training of the Ukrainian military," Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said on May 5 The Kremenchuk shopping mall attack killed more than 20 people and injured 59 Today’s missile strike hit a dacha (country house) neighborhood in the Kremenchuk district On June 27, 2022, a Russian Soviet-era Kh-22 missile carrying over 900 kilograms of explosives struck the Amstor shopping mall in Kremenchuk more than 1,000 people were inside the building Russian Defense Ministry claimed that its military struck warehouses with Western-provided weaponry next to the shopping mall and alleged detonation of ammunition purportedly caused a fire in the mall Moscow also falsely claimed that the mall “was not working” then calling it “one of the most daring terrorist acts in European history.” Foreign leaders also condemned Russia’s shopping mall attack emphasizing that indiscriminate attacks on innocent civilians constitute a war crime lies several hundred kilometers away from the frontlines and some 330 kilometers south of Kyiv Dinara Khalilova is a reporter at the Kyiv Independent where she has previously worked as a news editor In the early weeks of Russia’s full-scale invasion she worked as a fixer and local producer for Sky News’ team in Ukraine Dinara holds a BA in journalism from Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv and a Master’s degree in media and communication from the U.K.’s Bournemouth University your new go-to podcast to spice up your weekday mornings with relevant news and behind-the-scenes from Brussels and beyond From the economy to the climate and the EU's role in world affairs this talk show sheds light on European affairs and the issues that impact on our daily lives as Europeans Tune in to understand the ins and outs of European politics Dare to imagine the future with business and tech visionaries Deep dive conversations with business leaders Euronews Tech Talks goes beyond discussions to explore the impact of new technologies on our lives the podcast provides valuable insights into the intersection of technology and society Europe's water is under increasing pressure floods are taking their toll on our drinking water Join us on a journey around Europe to see why protecting ecosystems matters and to discover some of the best water solutions an animated explainer series and live debate - find out why Water Matters We give you the latest climate facts from the world’s leading source analyse the trends and explain how our planet is changing We meet the experts on the front line of climate change who explore new strategies to mitigate and adapt Russian troops struck a shopping centre in Kremenchuk in the Poltava region with at least two missiles on Monday afternoon with over a thousand people inside At least 16 people were killed in the strike while around 60 were injured according to the latest information available early on Tuesday morning At least 25 were left hospitalised with several victims of the missile strike said to be in critical condition local authorities said the previous evening as one drilled into what remained of the shopping centre's roof Footage and images from the scene show that the entire shopping centre was engulfed in the blaze with emergency crews and passers-by trying to help the victims firefighters are trying to extinguish the fire the number of victims is impossible to imagine," President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated on his Telegram account The attack was reminiscent of earlier strikes against civilian targets since Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February such as the air strike on the Drama Theatre in the eastern port city of Mariupol in March killing an estimated 600 of the people sheltering there The Amstor shopping centre was "no threat to the Russian army" and had "no strategic value" adding that the aim of the attack was to undermine "people's attempts to live a normal life Zelenskyy further denounced the attack as a "brazen act of terrorism" against "a peaceful town and an ordinary shopping centre" in another Telegram video on Monday night said on Twitter that Russian troops "deliberately hit [the] shopping centre .. just because [they] want to kill," calling Russia "a terrorist state."  an important industrial city in central Ukraine and home to its biggest refinery came a day after Russian missiles hit a residential area of the capital Kyiv The city of about 220,000 is also a major railroad juncture and the site of a Roshen confectionery factory owned by former President Petro Poroshenko Many believe that attacks on targets in other regions of Ukraine far from the frontline in the Donbas point to an escalation of the Kremlin's aggression which has focused solely on the eastern region in recent months the UN Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting in New York on Tuesday to discuss the attack The missile strike unfolded as Western leaders pledged continued support for Ukraine at a G7 summit in Germany