14 dead in Russian border city Belgorod after Kyiv launches retaliatory strikes

Russia said 14 people including two children had been killed “indiscriminate” Ukrainian strikes on the nearby Russian provincial capital of Belgorod on Saturday.

They added that 108 people had been injured and vowed to retaliate.

“Today, the Kyiv regime attempted an indiscriminate combined strike on the city of Belgorod with two ‘Olkha’ missiles in a banned cluster configuration, as well as Czech-made Vampire rockets,” the Defence Ministry said in a Telegram posting. “This crime will not go unpunished.”

It said most of the rockets including both ‘Olkha’ missiles had been shot down, averting far greater casualties, although fragments had fallen on the city.

Poland ended a ground search on Saturday after finding no parts of a suspected Russian rocket which it said had violated the country’s airspace on Friday morning, the Polish army said.

“At 3:00 pm (1400 GMT), the inspection of the designated area was completed… The search result was negative,” the Polish army’s operational command wrote on social media platform X.

“Military activities have been completed and we do not plan any further field verification.”

Polish military officials said on Friday that an object had breached the country’s airspace from the direction of its border with Ukraine on Friday morning before exiting within three minutes of entry.

Ukrainian authorities had reported a mass attack on various cities throughout Ukraine in the early hours of Friday.

“The Ukrainian side and allies have preliminarily confirmed our radar records that the object had left Polish territory,” a spokesperson for the operational command told Reuters earlier on Saturday.

Nearly 500 soldiers of the Territorial Defense Force took part in the search near the city of Zamosc in southeastern Poland, the operational command said on X.

On Friday evening, Poland’s foreign ministry summoned the Russian charge d’affaires, demanding an explanation for the violation of its airspace.

Shelling in the centre of the Russian border city of Belgorod has killed 10 people and injured 45 more, emergency services said.

Russian officials accused Kyiv of carrying out the attack the day after an 18-hour aerial Russian barrage across Ukraine killed at least 39 civilians.

Images of Belgorod on social media showed cars on fire and plumes of black smoke rising among damaged buildings as air raid sirens sounded.

One strike hit close to a public ice rink in the heart of the city.

Ukrainian officials never acknowledge responsibility for attacks on Russian territory or the Crimean peninsula, but larger aerial strikes against Russia have previously followed heavy assaults on Ukrainian cities.

The death toll from Russia’s largest air attack on Ukraine rose to 39 on Saturday as rescuers continued to clear debris and rubble from the bombardment, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said.

Russia launched 158 missiles and drones on cities and towns across Ukraine on Friday in what Ukrainian officials described as the worst aerial bombardment since the start of the war in February 2022.

“Works to clear up the consequences of yesterday’s Russian attack are still underway. Almost 120 cities and villages, hundreds of civilian objects have suffered,” Zelenskiy said on the Telegram messaging app.

Two children were killed and several people were injured by a Ukrainian strike on the centre of the Russian provincial capital of Belgorod, regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Saturday.

Gladkov said a residential area had been hit, and in a Telegram posting urged all residents to move to air raid shelters as sirens sounded. An image posted by the Kommersant newspaper showed black smoke rising from the city.

The Belgorod region, which adjoins northern Ukraine, has like other Russian border zones suffered shelling and drone attacks all year that authorities have blamed on Ukraine.

Ukraine rarely claims responsibility for attacks inside its neighbour.

In his most recent social media post addressing yesterday’s aerial bombardment, Volodymyr Zelensky said: “This was the Russian scum’s largest attack. Almost 160 missiles and drones. Our warriors shot down most of them.

“Usual Russian targets: over 100 destroyed or damaged private houses, 45 multi-story residential buildings, schools, two churches, hospitals, a maternity ward, and many commercial and storage facilities. As of now, at least 30 people have been reported killed. My condolences to their close ones.

“Over 150 people have been injured, and all of them are receiving the necessary assistance. It’s important that the world responds to this terror. Many leaders have expressed their support for Ukraine and Ukrainians, and I thank each one of them.

“Especially those who helped our state with air defense. Today, our air defense warriors accomplished a lot. We will continue to strengthen our air defense and work to return war back to where it came from—to Russia.”

Russia will have sustained more than half a million personnel killed and wounded in its invasion of Ukraine by 2025 if casualties continue at the current rate, the UK believes.

The average daily number of the country’s troops injured or dead has risen by almost 300 per day over the course of 2023 compared to last year, according to the latest Defence Intelligence update.

The update said the increase “almost certainly” reflects the degradation of Russia’s forces and its transition to “a lower quality, high quantity mass army since the ‘partial mobilisation’ of reservists in September 2022”.

It will likely take Russia five to 10 years to rebuild a cohort of highly trained and experienced military units, it said.

Poland has renewed a search operation for elements of a suspected Russian rocket on Saturday, which it said had violated the country’s airspace on Friday morning.

“We inform that on December 30…a ground search will be carried out in the Lublin Voivodeship for possible elements of the object that violated Polish airspace yesterday,” the Polish army’s operational command wrote on social media platform X.

“The aim of the search is to definitively confirm that no element of the object remains on Polish territory.”

Polish military officials said on Friday that the object had left the country’s airspace within three minutes of entry from the direction of its border with Ukraine.

“The Ukrainian side and allies have initially confirmed our radar records that the object had left Polish territory,” a spokesperson for the operational command told Reuters.

Thirty-two Ukrainian drones have been detected over Russia, Moscow officials said, a day after an 18-hour aerial barrage across Ukraine killed at least 30 civilians.

Drones were seen in the skies over Russia’s Moscow, Bryansk, Oryol, and Kursk regions, the country’s defence ministry said in a statement.

It did not report any casualties and said all of drones were destroyed by air defences.

Cities across western Russia have come under regular attack from drones since May, with Russian officials blaming Kyiv.