Russians hit residential areas in Mykolaiv, says governor

Russian forces have hit multiple residential targets in the south central part of Ukraine overnight, according to Vitaliy Kim, governor of Mykolaiv.

Posting on his Telegram account, he said that Russian shelling had damaged homes, three hospitals, two education facilities, a hotel and a museum in the area.

Kim said the targets included a private house destroyed by a missile in the village of Vysunsk, Bereznehuvate, where one child is reported to have died and three others have shrapnel injuries.

He said the city of Mykolaiv was subjected to “massive rocket fire” overnight from Saturday into this morning, with many municipal buildings damaged and one person reported as injured so far.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said Russia is using “poverty and political chaos” to attack the lives of all Europeans.

In his evening address late on Saturday, president Zelensky said that by stopping the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, Russia wanted to “destroy the normal life of every European.”

Russia’s state energy firm Gazprom said on Saturday that the pipeline could be closed indefinitely.

Zelensky said:

Russia is trying to increase the energy pressure on Europe even more – gas pumping through the Nord Stream pipeline has completely stopped. Why do they do this? Russia wants to destroy the normal life of every European – in all countries of our continent. It wants to weaken and intimidate the entire Europe, every state.Where Russia cannot do it by force of conventional weapons, it does so by force of energy weapons. It is trying to attack with poverty and political chaos where it cannot yet attack with missiles.And to protect against this, we all in Europe need even more unity, even more coordination, even more help to each other.This winter, Russia is preparing for a decisive energy attack on all Europeans. And the key answers to this should be two things: first, our unity – unity in protection against the terrorist state, and second – Increasing our own pressure on Russia – this includes increasing sanctions at all levels, and limiting Russia’s oil and gas revenues.

Images are starting to come in of the damage done by Russian shelling overnight in Mykolaiv, in the south of Ukraine.

Reuters photographer, Umit Bektas, has captured the moment medical staff returned to clear up the wreckage of a primary care centre and family clinic in Mykolaiv this morning.

Ukraine’s first lady, Olena Zelensky, has just been speaking on the first episode of Laura Kuenssberg’s new Sunday show.

She said that all Ukrainians are afraid “but you can’t be so scared as to not do anything. You can’t be passive.”

“The prices are going up in Ukraine as well. But in addition our people get killed. So when you start counting pennies on your bank account or in your pocket, we do the same and count our casualties,” she said.