Russian invaders destroy 1,177 apartment buildings in Kharkiv

Valentyna Romanenko – Monday, 28 March 2022, 15:20

Russian air strikes and shellings have already destroyed 1,177 high-rise apartment buildings in Kharkiv.

Source: Ihor Terekhov, Kharkiv Mayor, during a press briefing on 28 March, quoted by Ukrinform

According to Terekhov: "The Russian army, the aggressor army, is deliberately – let me underscore this, deliberately – targeting residential neighbourhoods. These are not just individual buildings, but entire neighbourhoods. Their residents suffer relentless bombings. As of today, 1,410 buildings have been destroyed in the city, including 1,177 high-rise apartment buildings."

Details: According to Terekhov’s information, 53 kindergartens, 69 schools, and 15 hospitals have also been destroyed.

"Given this, we are now forced to relocate people to schools and kindergartens, to basements and metro stations," the Mayor noted.

He added that volunteers are risking their lives to deliver food to shelters and neighbourhoods where the shelling never stops.

Utility workers – including, for example, the 104 rubbish collection vehicles that went out to collect the city’s refuse on 28 March – also continue their work under constant shelling.

According to Terekhov, Kharkiv’s grocery stores are working and stocked with essentials. Kharkiv is also receiving humanitarian aid from other cities and countries, including the recent arrivals of shipments from the US. For example, the city of Chicago sent $880,000 worth of medication, which were shared among municipal hospitals and the military hospital.

The Mayor of Kharkiv also stressed that a spirit of unity and resistance prevails in Kharkiv and that the attitude of the Kharkiv residents towards Russia, the aggressor country, has radically changed.

According to Terekhov: "The city of Kharkiv is a Russian-speaking city. Before the war, a quarter of Kharkiv residents had relatives or acquaintances in the Russian Federation, many had friends there. The city of Kharkiv was always considered to be more or less loyal to the Russian Federation. Today the attitude to Russia, the aggressor country, the aggressor troops, is radically different.

I talk to people every day. Never in their worst nightmare could people have imagined that Russia would attack Ukraine, would attack the city of Kharkiv. Today each of us is prepared to defend our city to the very end. Kharkiv is united. An extraordinary spirit prevails – the spirit of resistance, the spirit of fighting, and the spirit of victory."