At least 3 dead, 31 injured in Kharkiv after Russian bombing, Ukraine says

Three people were killed and 31 injured on Monday after Russian shelling hit the northeast Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, the regional governor said.

The mayor of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, said on Telegram that the shelling struck civilian infrastructure including a commercial property and a tire repair shop.

These are “places which had no military significance,” Mayor Ihor Terekhov said, adding that two children aged four and 16 were among dozens of people taken to hospital.

“Several shells hit the yards of private houses. Garages and cars were also destroyed, several fires broke out,” regional Governor Oleh Synehubov said.

In the early hours of Monday a separate strike hit a school as well as a residential building and rescuers saved an 86-year-old woman from the rubble, he said. No one was reported killed.

Valentyna Popovychuk, a 74-year-old resident, described being rescued from the building.

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“I woke up in bed, I was all covered in dust. I went to the bathroom to wash myself and there more rubble and dust fell on me,” she said.

“I saw lights, the headlights of rescuers, and I started screaming ‘I am alive, please get me out’. The rescuers entered the hallway, knocked down the door and took me out.”

Russia, which invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, denies targeting civilians.

Kharkiv, which is close to the Russian border, suffered heavy bombardment in the initial phase of the war, followed by a period of relative calm, but that has been shattered by renewed shelling in recent weeks.