At least two people have been killed and 20 injured after a Russian missile hit a shopping mall in the Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said there were 1,000 civilians in the building at the time of the attack.
“The mall is on fire, firefighters are trying to put out the fire, the number of victims is impossible to imagine,” the country’s leader told Telegram.
The shopping center “posed no danger to the Russian military” and had “no strategic value” to the Russians, Mr Zelensky added.
Rescue workers are working on a site of a shopping mall hit by a Russian missile attack while Russia’s attack on Ukraine continues, in Kremenchuk, in the Poltava region, Ukraine, June 27, 2022.
/ via REUTERSHe said: “People just wanted to lead a normal life, which makes the occupiers so angry.
“Out of helplessness, Russia continues to beat ordinary people. It is in vain to expect it to be reasonable or humane. ”
Kremenchuk, an industrial city of 217,000 before Russia’s invasion, is the site of Ukraine’s largest oil refinery.
Boris Johnson condemned Vladimir Putin’s “cruelty and barbarism” after the attack.
“This horrific attack has once again shown the depths of cruelty and barbarism to which the Russian leader will sink,” he said.
“Once again, our thoughts are with the families of innocent victims in Ukraine. “Putin must realize that his behavior will do nothing but strengthen the determination of Ukraine and every other G7 country to stand by Ukraine for as long as it takes.”
It came the day after Russia attacked the Ukrainian capital Kiev for the first time in weeks, with missiles hitting at least two residential buildings.
Mr Zelensky’s office said at least six civilians had been killed and 31 injured as part of Russia’s intense shelling of several Ukrainian cities over the past 24 hours – including Kiev and major cities in the country’s south and east.
It said Russian forces fired rockets that killed two people and injured five overnight in and near Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, and continued to target the key southern port of Odesa.
A missile attack destroyed residential buildings and injured six people, including a child.
In Lysychansk, at least five high-rise buildings and the last road bridge have been damaged in the past 24 hours, the local governor said.
Serhiy Haidai said a major highway connecting the city with government-linked territory further south was rendered impassable due to protection that increased the evacuation of civilians.
The city had a pre-war population of about 100,000, of which about a tenth remained.
Analysts say Lysychansk’s location high on the banks of the Siverskiy Donets River, as well as its large hilly area, give a huge advantage to the city’s Ukrainian defenders.
The river encloses Lysychansk from the north and east, while the Ukrainian army still holds territory west of the city, which it uses to provide weapons and humanitarian aid.