LONDON (Reuters) – Russia on Wednesday denied Ukraine’s claims that it had attacked the city of Uman, visited by tens of thousands of Hasidic Jews a year, and showed photographs of what it said were Ukrainian forces carrying weapons near a synagogue.
LONDON (Reuters) – Russia on Wednesday denied Ukraine’s claims that it had attacked the city of Uman, visited by tens of thousands of Hasidic Jews a year, and showed photographs of what it said were Ukrainian forces carrying weapons near a synagogue.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told Israeli lawmakers on March 20 that Russia attacked Uman on the first day of the invasion in February, according to a transcript of the speech published by The Times of Israel.
“I would like to emphasize that the Russian Armed Forces are attacking civilian targets as part of the army’s special operation,” Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said of Zelensky’s remarks.
Russia, Konashenkov said, has touched any devotional buildings or other public places of worship.
Tens of thousands of Hasidic Jews descend on Uman every Jewish New Year to stop at the tomb of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov, who revived the Hasidic movement and died in 1810.
Konashenkov also showed photographs on March 21 of what appeared to be Ukrainian forces loading weapons near a synagogue in the city. Reuters could not independently determine the photographs.
Russia, he explained, has targeted fuel depots in Ukraine with air-launched missiles and used tactical missiles to destroy two primary arsenals of rockets in Ukraine.
“High-precision aerial missiles destroyed fuel depots in the Starokonstantinov and Khmelnitsky regions that were fueling the armored vehicles of Ukrainian troops in the Donbass,” Konashenkov said.
(Reporting via Guy Faulconbridge; editing by Andrew Cawthorne)