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Residents from the Belgorod region seek shelter in a hall
Photo: OLGA MALTSEVA / AFP
Belgorod Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov reports ongoing shelling in the Russian border region. In some places, debris fell from the sky, Gladkov wrote in the messenger service Telegram. The debris is said to have come from flying objects shot down by air defense.
Earlier, Gladkov reported that two people had been killed on Saturday. 4000 are said to have been brought to safety.
The paramilitary association "Russian Volunteer Corps" released a video purporting to show fighters in the border town of Shebekino. The association fights on the side of Ukraine and consists of Russian nationalists. The group also claimed to have taken Russian soldiers as prisoners. Initially, this could not be independently verified. According to Gladkov, saboteurs are also said to have penetrated the border area.
According to Russian media, the Gladkov Volunteer Corps sent a video message. In it, they invited him to a church in Novaya Tavolzhanka in the Belgorod region for dialogue and announced that they would hand over two prisoners.
The border region has been shelled for days. Authorities had already called on residents to get to safety.
Russia, which launched a war of aggression against neighboring Ukraine more than 15 months ago, has complained of increasing shelling of its own territory in recent weeks. However, the number of victims and damage are disproportionate to the consequences of the war in Ukraine, where thousands of civilians have been killed since the beginning of the Russian invasion.
kha/dpa