KYIV — Russian shelling of a residential building in the eastern Ukrainian city of Sloviansk, Ukraine has killed at least eight people and injured 21 others.

Among the victims was a toddler who died in an ambulance on the way to the hospital after he was pulled out of the rubble.

The governor of the Donetsk region, Pavlo Kyrylenko, reported that seven Russian S-300 missiles had been fired at Sloviansk on Friday.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky offered his condolences to the families of the victims and said that “not a single hour of this week before Easter has gone by without Russian murders and terror.”

“Rescue operations are under way in Sloviansk, Donetsk Oblast. Another terrorist attack. S-300 missiles fired at residential areas, at ordinary civilian buildings,” Zelensky said in his nightly address.

“There are people under the rubble. Everything is being done to save them, everything is being done to save the wounded. We have the first information about the dead. My condolences to those who have lost their loved ones,” he added.

With Russian mercenaries advancing westwards from the city of Bakhmut, Ukraine is preparing its troops for a large-scale counter-offensive.

The UK’s Ministry of Defense says Kyiv still holds western districts of the town — but said Moscow is stepping up its artillery attacks.

Sloviansk lies in a part of the Donetsk region that is under Ukrainian control. It is close to territory controlled by Russia. — Euronews