Hundreds of Russian mobilised troops were killed in a Ukrainian HIMARS strike on a barracks in Russian-occupied Makiivka in the eastern Donbas region, minutes before midnight on December 31.
The attack happened as Russian missiles and drones rained down on Kyiv, Ukraine at the exact moment Russian president Vladimir Putin was delivering his televised New Year address.
What makes the revelation more stunning is that both armies have admitted to the deaths, a rare occurrence since the invasion began in February 2022.
While Ukraine’s military command puts the number of Russian deaths to 400, with 300 wounded, reports in Moscow suggested lower figures but do admit to a major loss of life, Daily Mail reports.
This is the highest number of killings recorded by Russia’s army in one attack, since the start of the invasion on February 24, 2022.
Ukrainian blogger, Anatoly Shariy, who is also a staunch Russian supporter, posted in dismay: ‘There are SEVERAL HUNDRED killed in Makiivka.’
He added with sarcasm: ‘Someone smart put them all together in one place.
Russian pro-war sources said two HIMARS missile strikes hit the barracks in Makiivka, while the Moscow-installed administration of the region in Ukraine said on Sunday, that at least 25 rockets were fired at the region overnight on New Year’s Eve.
A woman is on the balcony of her residential block and returns screaming in terror as an incoming attack targets a building nearby, which was later revealed to be a vocational school that was turned into a barracks for Russian forces.
HIMARS – which stands for High Mobility Artillery Rocket System – is a US-made launcher which can fire six guided missiles.
‘According to a number of sources, we can talk about 50 to 70 people [dead] at the moment.
The building is completely destroyed,’ reported the Grey Zone outlet which is linked to Putin ally Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner private army.
Daniil Bezsonov, a senior Russian-backed official in the Moscow-controlled parts of the Donetsk region, also confirmed the news saying that there was a strike on a vocational school, which according to preliminary information served as military personnel quarters.
The attack, Bezsonov said, happened two minutes after midnight on New Year’s Day.
‘A massive blow was dealt to the vocational school from American MLRS HIMARS. There were dead and wounded, the exact number is still unknown,’ Bezsonov said on the Telegram messaging app.
‘The building itself was badly damaged.’
