Ukraine has asked civilians in the eastern region of the Luhansk region to escape Russian shelling following officials stating more than 50 people trying to evacuate by train from a nearby region were killed in a missile attack.
Air raid sirens rang out across the eastern region of Ukraine on Saturday morning, officials stated, as Luhansk Governor Serhiy Gaidai, in an address, urged people to leave as Russia was amassing forces for an offensive.
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for a “firm global response” to Friday’s missile attack on a railway station crowned with women, children as well as the elderly in Kramatorsk, in the Donetsk region.
The city mayor, who noted 4,000 people were gathered there at the time, said at least 52 died.
Meanwhile, Russia’s defence ministry denied responsibility for the attack, saying in a statement the missiles that hit the station were used only by Ukraine’s military and that Russia’s armed forces had no targets assigned in Kramatorsk on Friday.
All statements by the Ukrainian authorities on the attack were “provocations”, it said.
Notably, Russia has called for a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24. Over 4.3 million people have fled Ukraine to neighbouring nations.
As per the United Nations, approximately 1,600 civilians have died, and the actual number is expected to be higher.
Whereas, Ukrainian officials have been claiming that casualties on the Russian side have also been hard to assess. He further added, “More than 19,000 Russian soldiers have been killed so far since the beginning of the war.”