Waves of Russian missiles pounded a military training base close to Ukraine’s border with Poland on Sunday, killing 35 people.
The attack followed Russian threats to target foreign weapons shipments that are helping Ukrainian fighters defend their country against Russia’s invasion.
More than 30 Russian cruise missiles targeted the sprawling training facility that is less than 15 miles (25km) from the closest border point with Poland, according to the governor of Ukraine’s western Lviv region. Poland, a member of Nato, is a key location for routeing Western military aid to Ukraine.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine, Lviv had largely been spared the scale of destruction unfolding further east and become a destination for residents escaping bombarded cities and for many of the nearly 2.6 million refugees who have fled the country.
The training centre in Yavoriv appears to be the most westward target struck so far in the 18-day invasion.
The facility, also known as the International Peacekeeping and Security Centre, has long been used to train Ukrainian military personnel, often with instructors from the United States and other Nato countries.
It has also hosted international Nato drills. As such, the site symbolises what has long been a Russian complaint: that the alliance of 30 countries is moving ever closer to Russia’s borders. Russia has demanded that Ukraine drop its ambitions to join Nato.
Lviv governor Maksym Kozytskyi said most of the missiles fired on Sunday “were shot down because the air defence system worked”. The ones that got through killed at least 35 people and injured 134 others, he said.
Russian fighters also fired at the airport in the western city of Ivano-Frankivsk, 155 miles (250km) from Ukraine’s border with Slovakia and Hungary, an attack the city’s mayor said was intended “to sow panic and fear”.
