Civilian killed, 6 wounded by Russian missile in Ukraine's Donetsk region

By Gozde Bayar

ANKARA (AA) - A civilian was killed and six others injured when a Russian missile exploded in the Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, near the Donetsk region, officials said Tuesday.

The military attacked the central part of Kramatorsk with an R-37 missile, said Donetsk Oblast Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko.

He said the casualties occurred as a result of the explosion, according to Ukraine-based Kyiv Independent News.

Earlier, Dmytro Mozorov, the head of the Kramatorsk Police Investigation Department, said that the missile exploded at around 11.35 a.m. local time (0835GMT) and it exploded in the air without falling to the ground.

The missile exploded above four apartments in the city center, where only civilians live without military infrastructure, noted Mozorov, adding that an investigation has begun into the attack.

Donetsk and Luhansk -- both part of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region bordering Russia -- were the scenes of a Russian-backed insurgency starting in 2014 when Russia illegally annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula.

Russian President Vladimir Putin recognized the “independence” of Donetsk and Luhansk just before launching the war on Ukraine on Feb. 24.

As with Crimea, all of Donbas is still internationally recognized as Ukrainian territory, and the country’s armed forces continue to fight for it.

More than 5,100 civilians have been killed in Ukraine since the beginning of the war, according to UN figures.

At least 16 million people have been forced to flee their homes, including 9.2 million that have fled to other countries.

*Writing by Gozde Bayar in Ankara.