Three killed in Russian drone attack on Ukraine’s Odesa

Issued on: 10/06/2023 – 08:31

8:15am: Ukraine says three killed in Russian drone attack on Odesa

Three civilians were killed during a Russian drone attack on the Black Sea city of Odesa in the early hours of Saturday after drone debris fell on an apartment block starting a fire, the Ukrainian military has said.

Air defences in Odesa region shot down eight “Shahed” drones and two missiles in the latest in a spate of overnight air strikes on Ukrainian cities in recent weeks, a spokesperson for the southern military command said.

“As a result of the air fight, debris from one of the drones fell onto a high-rise apartment, causing a fire,” the military official, Natalia Humeniuk, said in a statement.

The emergency services said 27 people, including three children, were wounded, but that the fire had been rapidly put out and 12 people were rescued from the building.

6:25am: Investigators find clues in Nord Stream pipeline probe, WSJ reports

German investigators are examining evidence suggesting a sabotage team used Poland as an operating base to damage the Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea in September, the Wall Street Journal reports.

German investigators have fully reconstructed the two-week voyage of the “Andromeda”, a 50-foot (15-metre) white pleasure yacht suspected of being involved in the sabotage of the pipelines that supply Russian gas to Europe, the newspaper said.

They have pinpointed that the yacht deviated from its target to venture into Polish waters, it said, citing data from the Andromeda’s radio and navigation equipment, satellite and mobile phones, Gmail accounts “and DNA samples left aboard, which Germany has tried to match to at least one Ukrainian soldier”.

Germany’s Federal Criminal Police Office and Poland’s Office of Chancellery of the Prime Minister did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.

The Washington Post reported this week that the U.S. had learned of a Ukrainian plan to attack the pipelines three months before they were damaged by the underwater explosions.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday told German media that Ukraine did not attack Nord Stream pipelines.

10:30pm: Water gradually receding in Ukraine’s flooded regions

Water levels in parts of southern Ukraine that were flooded after the destruction of a Russian-held dam were beginning to fall, officials said Friday.

“Thirty-five settlements remain flooded on the right bank, 3,763 houses are under water, but the water is gradually receding,” said Oleksandr Prokudin, head of the Kherson military administration.

Prokudin said water levels in his region went from an average 5,38 to near 5 meters over the course of Friday. 

He said 2,588 people had been evacuated from the Kherson region.

Key developments from Friday, June 9:

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday said Ukraine had started its long-expected counteroffensive, but that Kyiv had so far failed to attain its goals, as Moscow’s forces claimed to have repelled fierce Ukrainian offensives in the Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk regions.

The fighting came as Ukraine‘s domestic security service said it intercepted a telephone call purportedly proving that Russian forces blew up the Kakhovka dam, triggering catastrophic flooding in southern Ukraine and forcing thousands of residents to flee.

Read yesterday’s live blog to see how the day’s events unfolded.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)