Ukraine war: Bombs rain down on Russian-occupied Luhansk as Putin under pressure
Videos circulating on Telegram show a huge fire and a black cloud of smoke over the Russian-occupied city of Luhansk in Donbas, eastern Ukraine.
Loud explosions were heard in Russian-occupied Luhansk, eastern Ukraine after a key military airfield was struck on Monday.
Two missile strikes were reported in the Donbas city within three hours.
Moscow-installed governor Leonid Pasechnik said the first attack at around 9pm local time (1pm ET) involved cluster munitions.
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An airbase taken over by Vladimir Putin's army - the former Luhansk Higher Military Aviation School - is believed to have been targeted. It is located in close proximity to an aircraft repair plant.
Kyiv has continuously attacked Russian military bases, ammunition depots and weapon factories in a bid to slow down their assault, which first started in February 2022.
Russian-occupied Luhansk.
— Illia Ponomarenko
Good god, this is a massive hit now. pic.twitter.com/rsI7X91zol
Ukraine has yet to comment on the incident, but it underlines the relentless fightback by Volodymyr Zelensky's forces as they look to regain territory illegally annexed by Russia months after the outbreak of war.
Luhansk had a pre-war population of 409,000 though many residents have since fled or been killed.
The shelling coincides with fuel depots also being targeted in the area in recent weeks.
Pasechnik said "a fire has broken out as a result of the attack," before suggesting the number of casualties is being assessed.
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On Monday, Zelensky secured from Spain a pledge of additional air defence missiles to help fight the about 3,000 bombs that he says Russia launches every month at Ukraine.
However, Ukraine still urgently needs another seven US-made Patriot air defence systems to stop Russia hitting the power grid and civilian areas, as well as military targets, with devastating glide bombs that wreak wide destruction, Zelensky said.
“If we had these modern Patriot systems, (Russian) airplanes wouldn’t be able to fly close enough to drop the (glide) bombs on the civilian population and the military,” Zelensky told a news conference in Madrid.
Glide bombs are heavy Soviet-era bombs fitted with precision guidance systems and launched from aircraft flying out of range of air defences. The bombs weigh more than a ton and blast targets to smithereens, leaving a huge crater.
