Russia says 20 killed, 10 injured in Ukraine attack on bakery in occupied east

Following an attack by the Ukrainians on a building including a bakery in the city of Lysychansk in the occupied eastern Ukrainian district of Luhansk on Saturday, the emergencies ministry of Russia said that its personnel had recovered the remains of twenty persons among the debris.

The ministry released a video showing rescue personnel pulling two wounded victims from the wreckage of a building and placing them on stretchers when it was still dark outside.

The ministry had earlier said that its personnel had saved ten lives and given them to medical professionals.

Reuters was able to confirm the location of a different daylight video that the emergency ministry supplied by analysing the building’s architecture and colour as well as a sign that matched file photos of the region. It corresponds to an address marked as Adriatic Restaurant on Moskovska Street in Lysychansk on Google Maps.

Reuters, however, was unable to independently confirm the date of the clip or any other information originating from a territory that Russia claimed to have conquered in 2022.

Regarding the event, Ukrainian officials have not released a statement.

“Dozens of civilians” were inside the building when the strike occurred, according to Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, and Western weaponry were employed.

The Russian-controlled Luhansk Information Centre said Ukraine shelled the bakery using the US-supplied High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS).

Russia’s state-run TASS news agency quoted a Russian-installed official in operational services as saying the average age of the victims was “35 years, plus or minus five years.”

“There are no children among the dead at the moment, but the removal of rubble is still ongoing,” it quoted the official as saying.

Earlier, Leonid Pasechnik, put in charge of Ukraine’s Luhansk region by Moscow, said dozens of people may be under the rubble.