Video shared by the deposed Mariupol City Council shows an explosion.
Mariupol City Council/Telegram
Ukrainian armed forces hit Mariupol on Friday with two long-range missiles, according to the occupied city’s Russian-installed mayor, Oleg Morgun.
In a Telegram post, Morgun said emergency services were at the scene but there were no deaths, injuries or damage to the city’s infrastructure, according to preliminary reports.
Officials with the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic had earlier said explosions in the city Friday were due to a Ukrainian rocket attack, and social media videos showed images which CNN geolocated to the site of the Azovstal steel plant, the infamous site of a weeks-long siege in the early months of Russia’s full-scale invasion.
What Ukrainian officials are saying: Petro Andriushchenko, an adviser to the city’s Ukrainian mayor, chimed in about Friday’s blast in a series of Telegram posts.
He said Russian forces have set up checkpoints blocking a bridge near the Azovstal plant, and described a scene of confusion, with Russian emergency workers at the scene of the strike.
The Ukrainian official said Russian forces set up an ammunition depot near the plant. CNN cannot independently verify this claim.
“The hit was on the territory of Azovstal,” Andriushchenko said. “Remember we said that they were setting up a base there to avoid strikes? Well, they set it up along with the ammo depot.”
Andriushchenko went on to mock the Russian-backed officials’ handling of the strikes.
“Buses with workers are being sent to Azovstal to clear the rubble,” he said. “The official version is that they are looking for ‘workers.’ Why on earth would you need workers in the middle of the night is clear to everyone … we can conclude that everything is bad at Azovstal.”
Ukraine has not claimed responsibility for the strike.
