By FRANCESCA EBEL and MARIA GRAZIA MURRU
Associated Press
KRAMATORSK, Ukraine (AP) -- Russian shelling killed at least eight civilians in eastern Ukraine over the past 24 hours and wounded 25 more, Ukrainian officials said Wednesday. Pro-Russia separatists said attacks by Ukrainian forces killed four civilians.
The Ukrainian presidential office said Russian forces targeted cities and villages in the country's southeast, with most civilian casualties occurring in Donetsk province, where Russia stepped up its offensive in recent days.
Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko urged the province's more than 350,000 remaining residents to flee late Tuesday, saying that evacuating Donetsk was necessary to save lives and allow the Ukrainian army to put up a better defense against the Russian advance.
Donetsk is part of the Donbas, a mostly Russian-speaking industrial area where Ukraine's most experienced soldiers are concentrated. Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday declared the complete seizure of the region's other province, Luhansk, after Ukrainian troops withdrew from the last city under their country.
Luhansk Gov. Serhiy Haidai denied Wednesday that the Russians had completely captured the province. Heavy fighting continued in villages around Lysychansk, the city Ukrainians soldiers withdrew from and which Russian troops took on Sunday, he said.
The Ukrainian armed forces General Staff said in its regular social media update late Wednesday that Ukrainian troops had rebuffed enemy units advancing towards Sloviansk in Donetsk, which is seen as a potential key target for Moscow.
Pro-Russian separatists have fought Ukrainian forces and controlled much of the Donbas for eight years. Before Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, Putin recognized the independence of the two self-proclaimed separatist republics in the region.
Separatist authorities in Donetsk said Wednesday that four civilians were killed and another 14 wounded in Ukrainian shelling over the past 24 hours. News reports said shelling hit an ammunition depot on Tuesday, triggering massive explosions.
To the north of Donetsk, Russian forces also hit Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city, with missile strikes overnight, the Kharkiv regional governor said Wednesday on Telegram.
Closer to the front line and in a more abandoned district of the city, first responders crunched through the debris of another overnight attack at the national teaching university in Kharkiv. Pages of dusty textbooks flapped in the breeze.
The attacks indicated the city, which is located close to the Russian border, is unlikely to get a reprieve as the war grinds on into its fifth month.
In other developments:
-- European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the 27-nation European Union needs to make emergency plans to prepare for a complete cut-off of Russian gas in the wake of the Kremlin's war in Ukraine.
-- A court in Russia ordered a pipeline bringing oil from Kazakhstan to Europe halted for 30 days for what it said were environmental violations, Russian media reported.
-- A top Russian official warned the United States could face the "wrath of God" if it works to help establish an international tribunal to investigate Russia's actions in Ukraine. Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy secretary of Russia's Security Council, denounced the U.S. for what he described as its efforts to "spread chaos and destruction across the world for the sake of 'true democracy.'"