The Kremlin did not call missile strikes on Ukraine a response to the shelling of Donetsk

Press Secretary of the Russian President Dmitry Peskov said that the morning strikes by the Russian military on the territory of Ukraine cannot be called a response to the shelling of civilians in Donetsk on January 21. He told reporters about this at a briefing.

"No you can not. We continue our special operation. And our military does not hit social facilities or residential areas. And they don’t hit civilians, unlike the Kyiv regime. This is what fundamentally distinguishes our military from the military of the Kyiv regime,” Peskov said.

Earlier, a representative of the emergency services told TASS that on the morning of January 23, as a result of strikes on Kharkov, the location of foreign mercenaries was damaged. The mayor of the city, Igor Terekhov, confirmed information about a series of explosions in his Telegram channel .

The Ukrainian Armed Forces fired at shopping arcades in the Donetsk microdistrict Tekstilshchik on January 21. The attack killed 28 people, said DPR head Denis Pushilin. At least 25 more people were injured of varying severity, including two teenagers. On the same day, the Ukrainian Armed Forces carried out another series of attacks, wounding five people and killing one.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the shelling of Donetsk.

On January 22, Peskov called the rocket attack on civilians in Donetsk an act of “monstrous terrorism . ” The Ukrainian Armed Forces specifically use indiscriminate weapons, which entail heavy casualties, he said.