Russian airstrikes on Friday killed two women and injured eight others in the northeastern city of Sumy, Ukraine, prompting urgent calls for evacuation from areas near the Russian border.
Sumy, located close to Russia’s Kursk region, has become a hotspot following Ukraine’s surprise offensive on August 6, which aimed to create a “buffer zone” within Russian territory.
Regional prosecutors confirmed that a 37-year-old woman was found dead beneath the rubble of a building struck in the attack. A 48-year-old woman, critically injured in the same strike, later died in the hospital.
The assault also ignited a fire and left eight others wounded.
With shelling intensifying, Governor Volodymyr Artiukh has urged residents of 183 settlements in the Sumy region to evacuate, warning, “It is dangerous to stay in these territories now.” So far, over 21,000 people have fled the border area.
In other regions, Russian strikes wounded eight people in Dnipropetrovsk, Kherson, and Kharkiv. Later on Friday, another strike hit Kurakhove in the eastern Donetsk region, damaging a residential building, an administrative office, and a shop, and injuring at least five people, according to local authorities.
Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk reported that his forces intercepted 12 Shahed drones overnight, with four others crashing before they could reach their targets.
Meanwhile, Russian forces continued their advance in eastern Ukraine, capturing two more villages on Thursday.7
