Russian air attack on museum kills two, Ukraine says

A Russian missile has hit a museum building in a Ukrainian town, killing at least two people and wounding 10 others, part of a barrage of attacks coming as Ukraine is readying its forces for an expected spring counteroffensive.

Ukrainian officials said on Tuesday that the Russian military used S-300 air defence missiles to attack Kupiansk in the Kharkiv region, hitting the museum of local history in the town centre. The Russian military has repeatedly used S-300s, which Ukraine’s air defences cannot intercept, to attack ground targets.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted a video from the site that shows the ruined building and emergency responders examining the damage.

“The terrorist country is doing everything to destroy us completely,” Zelenskyy said. “Our history, our culture, our people. Killing Ukrainians with absolutely barbaric methods.”

Zelenskyy said a museum worker was killed. Kharkiv regional Governor Oleh Syniehubov later reported that the body of another victim was pulled from under the rubble.

Syniehubov said three people were hospitalised and seven received minor injuries.

Kupiansk was captured by Russian forces in the earlier stages of the Russian invasion but was reclaimed by Ukrainian forces in a surprise counteroffensive in September that saw the Russians driven out of broad swathes of the Kharkiv region.

A woman also died in Russian shelling of the town of Dvorichna, near Kupiansk, and two civilians were killed in the eastern Donetsk region, according to the Ukrainian presidential office.

The Ukrainian military is now preparing for a powerful new counteroffensive, relying on the latest supplies of Western battle tanks and other weapons as well as troops that have been trained in the West.

Zelenskyy on Tuesday met with the top military brass to discuss the battlefield situation as well as prospects for new weapons supplies and the preparation of troops.

“We have to accelerate the pace of weapons supply because every day of delay is the lives of our soldiers,” Zelenskyy said on Facebook.

Ukraine’s military intelligence chief, Major General Kyrylo Budanov, in an interview with RBC-Ukraine released Monday, described the planned counteroffensive as a “landmark battle in Ukraine’s modern history” that would see the country “reclaim significant areas”.

Meanwhile on Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing Moscow to take temporary control over foreign assets if Russian assets abroad are seized, the state’s TASS news agency reported.

TASS said the decree mentioned Uniper SE’s Russian division and the assets of Finland’s Fortum Oyj.