At least four killed in Russian air strike on Kryvyi Rih

At least four people have been killed in a Russian air strike on the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih, the governor of Dnipropetrovsk said on his official Telegram account.

Three women and one man were killed in the attack which partially destroyed an educational institution and damaged nearby residential buildings.

“There are no words to justify it. There is no excuse. This is really genocide. Against peaceful educational establishments,” said local resident, Oleksandr.

According to the Dnipropetrovsk regional military administration, a further 14 people, including four children, were injured in the strike.

Five of the injured were taken to hospital with the rest treated by emergency responders at the scene.

“Each such terrorist attack is another reminder of who we are dealing with. Russia will not stop on its own – it can only be stopped by joint pressure,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who was born in the city, said in a post on Telegram.

Ukraine’s Air Force had earlier warned of a ballistic missile threat and said it had detected a high-speed target heading towards the city.

Kryvyi Rih has a population of around 660,000 and is the second-largest city in Dnipropetrovsky Oblast. It has been a frequent target of Russian aerial attacks in almost three years of war.

In his nightly video address, Zelenskyy said if Ukraine had been provided with the air defence systems he has asked for, the missile that hit Kryvyi Rih would have been intercepted.

“Such strikes and such losses would no longer occur if we had received all the necessary air defence systems, which we have been discussing with partners for so long and which are available worldwide,” he said speaking in Kyiv.

“Today, I held a meeting of the National Security and Defenxe Council. The issues were varied, but generally about our independence in weaponry. The production of drones, the missile programme, technological components for the army, including robotic systems. We are working on larger procurements and increased production scales in Ukraine.”

The Kryvyi Rih attack comes a day after a delegation of senior UN officials met Zelenskyy in Kyiv to discuss ways to strengthen humanitarian support for Ukraine.

Those meetings came after the UN launched a humanitarian appeal for $3.32 billion (€3.22 billion) to support more than eight million people affected by the war with Russia.

In a statement, the UN said the funding was to “support critical assistance” for around six million people living inside Ukraine with some of the money designated to assist the governments of 11 countries hosting Ukrainian refugees.

In recent weeks, Zelenskyy has engaged in a flurry of diplomatic activity, meeting heads of government and defence ministers to discuss continued military support for Ukraine’s war effort.

That comes in the run-up to Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday, which is expected to signal a departure from the outgoing US administration’s pledge to stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes to defeat Russia.

On the campaign trail Trump has been critical of the amount of money Washington has sent to Ukraine, both in military and humanitarian aid, and said he could end the war “in a day” without giving any details about how.

Trump has also indicated he wants Europe to shoulder more of the burden for helping Ukraine.