Russian forces continue to attack Ukraine, and according to officials, 26 people, including five children, were killed in bombings in various Ukrainian cities on Friday.
Officials in the capital, Kiev, said preparations for retaliation against Moscow’s forces were almost complete.
According to the news agency AFP, the new attacks also bombed a residential block in the historic city of Uman in central Ukraine, where AFP journalists saw rescue workers removing the remains of victims from a destroyed residential building.
There was a lull in Russian attacks over the past week, which ended with a barrage of about two dozen missiles aimed at crippling Ukraine’s energy reserves during the winter months.
On Friday evening, workers recovered the body of another child from under the rubble in Uman. Officials say that 23 people, including four children, were killed in the Russian cruise missile attack in Oman.
Earlier, Dmitriy, a 33-year-old citizen from the eastern city of Luhansk, under Russian administration, was seen looking for his children.
“I want to see my children; they are under the rubble,” he said.
At the time, rescue workers were using cranes to search for survivors in the rubble of a multi-story housing block in the city. The population of the city is about 80 thousand people.
“I’ve seen a lot, but I haven’t lost my children before,” Dimitri said. Now I want to see my children, alive or dead.
Russian missiles also hit the central city of Dnipro. In January of this year, more than 40 people were killed in an attack on a residential building in this city.
A 31-year-old woman and her two-year-old daughter were killed in recent attacks in Dnipro, officials said.
The young woman’s parents have been hospitalised.
According to regional authorities, neighbours said it was a quiet and kind family.
Also in the southern region of Kherson, officials said on Friday evening that Russian forces shelled the village of Belozerka, killing a 57-year-old woman and injuring three others.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky condemned the latest missile attacks and vowed to respond.
He said in his address that “only absolute evil can give rise to such terrorism against Ukraine.”
“Give us arms if you don’t want this to spread around the world,” tweeted his adviser, Mykhailo Podoliak. Lots of weapons and bans on attackers.’
Moscow has said it has targeted Ukrainian army reserve forces and weapons caches in missile strikes.
Meanwhile, pro-Moscow authorities in eastern Ukraine said that nine people, including an eight-year-old girl, were killed in the city of Donetsk by Ukrainian shelling.