Fri. Nov 22nd, 2024
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A Chinese consular building has been damaged in a third successive night of air strikes on southern Ukrainian port cities, Ukrainian officials have said.

Regional Governor Oleh Kiper posted a photograph showing at least one broken window at the Chinese consulate in the Black Sea city of Odesa, but there was no sign of any other damage.

The consulate is located in Odesa’s city centre just across railway tracks from the port.

“The aggressor is deliberately hitting the port infrastructure — administrative and residential buildings nearby were damaged, also the consulate of the People’s Republic of China. It shows the enemy does not pay attention to anything,” Mr Kiper said on Telegram.

Beijing made no immediate public mention of the incident, which took place while Ukraine’s Economy Minister Taras Kachka was in China for the first high level Ukrainian visit since Russia’s invasion.

China said it told Mr Kachka it was willing to expand imports of Ukrainian goods.

Kyiv has long sought to persuade Beijing to distance itself from Moscow.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said 60,000 tons of agricultural products destined for China had been destroyed in an attack on another Ukrainian port city.

Shelling continues in Ukraine’s port cities

Moscow said it had carried out “retaliatory strikes”, days after it quit a deal allowing the safe passage of Ukrainian Black Sea grain shipments and accused Ukraine of being behind blasts on a bridge used to transport Russian military supplies.

Ukraine’s military said Russian forces launched 19 missiles and 19 drones overnight, and that five of the missiles and 13 of the drones were shot down.

“Russian terrorists continue their attempts to destroy the life of our country,” Mr Zelenskyy said on the Telegram messaging app.

“Together we will make it through this terrible time. And we will withstand the attacks of Russian evil,” he said.

In Odesa, a security guard was killed and at least eight others were hurt, including a child, Mr Kiper said.

A firefighter works at a site of an administrative building heavily damaged by a Russian missile strike.
A firefighter works at a site of an administrative building heavily damaged by a Russian missile strike in Odesa. (Reuters: Press service of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine)

Nineteen people were hurt in the city of Mykolaiv, and several residential buildings were damaged, regional governor Vitaliy Kim said.

Firefighters in Mykolaiv tackled a huge blaze that left a three-storey residential building without its top floor. Adjacent buildings were gutted by fire.

A Russian attack on the port of Chornomorsk on Wednesday damaged grain export infrastructure as well as the agricultural products which Mr Zelenskyy said were meant for China.

Ukrainian officials see the air strikes as an attack on global food security because Kyiv is a major grain exporter.

A man reacts next to his son's body near a building heavily damaged by a Russian missile attack.

Russian attacks destroyed homes and damaged grain export infrastructures in Ukraine’s port cities.  (Reuters: Stringer)

Mykhailo Podolayk, a senior adviser to Mr Zelenskyy, urged the international community to do more in response.

“Will we see an emergency convocation of the UN Security Council to discuss global food security? The international community chooses … to stand aside,” he wrote on Twitter.

Authorities in the north-eastern region of Kharkiv said separately a 61-year-old man had been killed there by Russian shelling on Thursday.

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Potential military cargo

Ukraine’s Defence Ministry said on Thursday it would consider all ships travelling to Russian ports and Ukrainian ports on the Black Sea that are occupied by Moscow as potential carriers of military cargo from July 21.

A day after Russia had warned that any ships travelling to Ukraine’s Black Sea ports would be seen as possibly carrying military cargoes, the Ukrainian Defence Ministry said it could repel what it called Russian aggression at sea.

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