Russian missile strike kills 41, injures 180 in Ukraine, as Zelensky demands West air defences

At least 41 people were killed and more than 180 wounded on Tuesday when Russia hit a military institute in the central town of Poltava, President Volodymyr Zelensky said, in one of the deadliest single strikes of the war.

Zelensky said in a video that Russian forces struck with two ballistic missiles, damaging a building of the Military Institute of Communications.

“The Russian scum will definitely be held accountable for this strike,” Zelensky said on the Telegram messaging app.

“The time interval between the alarm and the arrival of the deadly missiles was so short that it caught people in the middle of evacuating to the bomb shelter,” Ukraine’s defence ministry said.

Rescuers were still at work after saving 25 people, including 11 trapped under the rubble, according to the ministry.