???? Live: At least five killed in strike on Ukraine’s Luhansk, says Russian administration

Issued on: 31/05/2023 – 08:28

9:09am: Most Kyiv residents ‘relieved’ not to have been woken up by sirens in the night

Kyiv residents have reportedly experienced a rare night of respite from the sound of sirens and explosions. Reporting from the Ukrainian capital, FRANCE 24’s Gulliver Cragg said that the city had endured “17 massive attacks with drones, missiles or a combination of drones and missiles” over the course of the month of May alone.

“It has almost become the exception, rather than the rule, to have the possibility of sleeping the whole night through,” he said.

Cragg added that many Ukrainians had been anticipating “a Russian revenge attack” after yesterday’s drone assault on Moscow. 

01:12

8:59am: Drone crashes into southern Russian oil refinery, local officials say

A drone crashed into the Ilsky oil refinery in southern Russia’s Krasnodar region on Wednesday, causing no casualties or damage to infrastructure, Russian state-owned news agency RIA reported, citing local officials.

Russian officials have previously reported drone strikes on the Ilsky refinery, which is located across the Azov Sea from Ukraine. On Tuesday, Russia blamed Ukraine for a wave of attempted drone strikes on Moscow.

8:57am: Gazprom to ship 40.5 mcm of gas to Europe via Ukraine on Wednesday

Russia’s Gazprom said that it would ship 40.5 million cubic metres of gas to Europe via Ukraine on Wednesday.

5:40am: Five dead in Ukrainian shelling of Luhansk village, says Moscow-installed coordination centre

At least five people were killed and 19 wounded in what a Moscow-installed coordination centre has described as the Ukrainian shelling overnight of a village in the Russian-controlled east Ukrainian region of Luhansk.

“The strike on the village of Karpaty by Ukrainian armed groups… killed five and wounded 19,” Russian security authorities in the Lugansk region posted on Telegram.

A poultry farm and temporary accommodation for workers were damaged in the attack on Karpaty, 35 kilometres (22 miles) west of the city of Lugansk, the authorities added.

The Russians did not specify whether the killed and wounded were civilians or military personnel, although they had listed four workers killed in an earlier toll.

“The enemy fired four rockets” from one of the HIMARS mulitple launchers delivered to Kyiv by the US, the administration said.

9:41pm: IAEA chief asks Russia, Ukraine to protect Zaporizhzhia power plant

UN International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi on Tuesday asked Ukraine and Russia to respect five core principles to safeguard the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine, suggesting that he had not yet secured their agreement on protecting the facility.

Among the principles was that the power plant not be used as a base for heavy weapons such as multiple rocket launchers, artillery systems and munitions and tanks or for military personnel that could be used for an attack from the plant.

9:39pm: One dead in Russia after Ukrainian strike on centre for displaced people, governor says 

One person was killed and two others injured on Tuesday in a Ukrainian bombardment on a centre for displaced people in the Russian border region of Belgorod, the regional governor said.

“Ukrainian armed forces fired artillery at a centre for displaced people housing elderly civilians and children … a security guard was killed and two people were injured,” governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram.

Key developments from Tuesday, May 30:

The Russian capital was targeted by a rare drone attack Tuesday morning, causing “minor” damage to buildings and no casualties, the city’s mayor said.

Moscow, located more than 1,000 kilometres (620 miles) from Ukraine, has only rarely been targeted by drone attacks since the start of the conflict in Ukraine, even though such attacks have become more common elsewhere in Russia.

Ukraine’s air defence forces destroyed more than 20 drones in Russia-launched overnight air attacks on Kyiv, the military administration of the Ukrainian capital said early on Tuesday.

Calling it a “massive” attack launched in several waves, Serhiy Popko, the head of Kyiv’s military administration, said on the Telegram messaging app that Russia conducted the assault using Iranian-made Shahed drones only.

Read yesterday’s live blog to see how the day’s events unfolded.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP & Reuters)