Russian airstrikes on the Yavoriv military training area in Ukraine have left at least 35 people dead, according to the Lviv regional administration in a statement on Sunday.
About 30 missiles were fired from warplanes over the Black and Azov and hit the military base, said Lviv regional military administration chief Maksym Kozytsky in a Facebook statement. Another 134 people were hospitalized in the incident, his office said.
The Yavoriv military site is about 12 miles away from the Polish border and is some 25 miles from Lviv, located in western Ukraine.
“Russia has attacked the International Center for Peacekeeping & Security near Lviv. Foreign instructors work here. Information about the victims is being clarified,” Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov said on social media. “This is new terrorist attack on peace & security near the EU-NATO border. Action must be taken to stop this.”
Since the start of the invasion on Feb. 24, Russian forces have targeted western Ukraine with fewer strikes than in other parts of the country. However, starting late last week, Moscow appeared to have escalated strikes in the western portion of the country
Airstrikes hit the Lutsk airfield that left two Ukrainian servicemen dead and six people wounded, the head of the Volyn region, Yuriy Pohulyayko, told media outlets in a statement. The strikes also targeted an airport near Ivano-Frankiivsk, where residents were ordered to shelter after an air raid alert, Mayor Ruslan Martsinkiv said on social media.
But on Sunday, a UK minister, Michael Gove, said that the strikes near the Polish border marked a “significant escalation” in the conflict. Poland is a NATO country, and top officials in the alliance have said they will defend their territories if Russia attacks.
Ukraine said foreign military instructors have previously worked at the Yavoriv International Center for Peacekeeping and Security, which was hit, but a NATO official told Reuters that there were no personnel from the alliance there. It was not immediately clear whether any non-NATO states might have representatives there.
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