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Rescuers clear rubble in Vinnytsia, death toll rises

STORY: Ukraine's military said Vinnytsia, a usually quiet city 125 miles southwest of Kyiv, was hit by three Russian Kalibr cruise missiles fired from an unnamed submarine, and that Ukrainian forces had shot down two others.

The twisted remains of burnt-out cars and smouldering rubble lay in the street as emergency workers clear the rubble from the ground floor of the office building.

A missile hit the car park of the nine-storey "Yuvileinyi" office block at around 10.50 a.m. (0750 GMT), the State Emergency Service said. Nearby residential buildings were damaged in the strike, and a huge fire started, it added.

“We have information about 43 people missing. But we understand that part of them are in hospital now and part of them is dead, unfortunately,” said Ukraine's Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskiy during news statement at the scene.

A senior regional emergency service official said there was probably no chance of finding any more survivors under the rubble in Vinnytsia, which had a population of about 370,000 before Russia's invasion.

The Kremlin says it is engaged in a "special military operation" to demilitarize Ukraine and root out what it regards as dangerous nationalists. Kyiv and its Western allies reject that as a false pretext for an unprovoked war of aggression.