Summary
Three people died in a night of intense shelling across Ukraine, according to officials. Two people were reportedly killed in Kharkiv and four more were injured following a Russian air strike. A woman in her 80s also reportedly died amid Ukrainian shelling of Donetsk.
Russia launched a multi-wave overnight attack on Ukraine, using 70 air assault weapons, including cruise and hypersonic missiles and Iranian-made drones, Kyiv’s air force said.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said Russia attacked a blood transfusion centre in Kharkiv as he condemned the fatal strike as a “war crime”.
The official symbol of Ukraine has begun to replace the Soviet Union coat of arms on the shield of the Motherland Monument in the centre of Kyiv as part of derussification efforts. This morning in Ukraine, workers started to install a trident in place of the removed USSR hammer and sickle symbol.
A hostile drone was destroyed by air defences as it approached Moscow, city mayor Sergei Sobyanin said. Temporary restrictions that had been introduced at Moscow’s Vnukovo international airport were lifted, Russian-state run news agency RIA Novosti reported.
China was said to be in support of a third round of talks to find a framework for peace in Ukraine after a meeting of senior officials from about 40 countries in Saudi Arabia over the weekend.
Japan’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, whose family comes from Hiroshima, hit out at Russian threats to use nuclear weapons as the country marked the 78th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
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The Chonhar bridge to Crimea was damaged by a Ukrainian missile strike today, the RIA news agency cited the Moscow-appointed head of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, as saying.
Ukraine previously struck the same bridge, one of a handful of links between Crimea and mainland Ukraine, in June.
The acting governor of the Kherson region, Volodymyr Saldo, said on his Telegram channel that the bridge across the Tonky strait next to Crimea was also damaged along with a school.
In total, the Kyiv terrorists fired 12 missiles, 9 were shot down by our air defence. One civilian was wounded, passing over the bridge at the time of arrival. The gas pipeline from the Strelkovskoye field to Genichesk, which ran next to the bridge, was also interrupted. More than 20 thousand residents of the city were left without gas supply.
The bridge has no important military significance. Having switched to state terrorism, as always, vilely and lowly hits civilian infrastructure in order to disrupt the peaceful life of people.
The information about the strikes on two bridges in Crimea appeared today:
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) August 6, 2023
🔹The bridge over the Tonkyi Strait near Henichesk, which connects the town of Henichesk with the Arabat Spit. The gas pipeline next to the bridge was damaged.
🔹 Chongar Bridge, which connects the… pic.twitter.com/njIxs9y66s
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