Following the International Criminal Court’s decision to issue an arrest order for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russia’s commissioner for children’s rights, widespread Russian attacks against Ukraine persisted.
In the early hours of Saturday, the Ukrainian Air Force reported that 16 Russian drones had struck Ukraine on Friday. The air force leadership reported on Telegram that 11 out of 16 drones were destroyed “in the central, western, and eastern regions.” The western district of Lviv and the capital city of Kyiv were among the regions targeted.
Serhii Popko, the head of the Kyiv city government, claimed that Ukrainian air defences shot down all drones aiming at the country’s capital, but Maksym Kozytskyi, the regional governor of Lviv, said that only three of the six drones were shot down, with the remaining three landing in a neighbourhood bordering Poland. The attacks, according to the Ukrainian Air Force, were launched from Russia’s Bryansk province, which borders Ukraine, and the Sea of Azov’s eastern shore.
The Ukrainian military additionally said in its regular update Saturday morning that Russian forces over the previous 24 hours launched 34 airstrikes, one missile strike and 57 rounds of anti-aircraft fire. The Facebook update said that falling debris hit the southern Kherson province, damaging seven houses and a kindergarten.
According to the Ukrainian statement, Russia is continuing to concentrate its efforts on offensive operations in Ukraine’s industrial east, focusing attacks on Lyman, Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Marinka and Shakhtarsk in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk province. Pavlo Kyrylenko, regional Gov. of the Donetsk province, said one person was killed and three wounded when 11 towns and villages in the province were shelled on Friday.
Further west, Russian rockets hit a residential area overnight Friday in the city of Zaporizhzhia, the regional capital of the partially occupied province of the same name. No casualties were reported, but houses were damaged and a catering establishment destroyed, Anatoliy Kurtev of the Zaporizhzhia City Council said.
The International Criminal Court said Friday that it has issued an arrest warrant for Putin for war crimes, accusing him of personal responsibility for the abductions of children from Ukraine, together with Russia’s commissioner for children’s rights, Maria Lvova-Belova.
