HIGHLIGHTS
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The war in Ukraine continued to shatter the lives of millions of people across the country, as reports of new attacks emerge, and the fighting escalates in the east.
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Nearly 2,000 people have been directly affected by one strike alone, which hit a residential area of the town of Serhiivka near Odesa in the early hours of 1 July.
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Damages to civilian infrastructure are alarmingly impacting people’s access to essential services, particularly water, electricity and health services in the Donbas region.
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Humanitarians have reached more people than initially targeted, yet far from covering the needs of 16 million Ukrainians who require humanitarian assistance.
ANALYSIS
General security and humanitarian situation
The war in Ukraine continued to shatter the lives of millions of people across the country, as reports of new attacks emerge, and the fighting escalates in the east. On 1 July, missiles hit a residential building and a recreational centre in the south of the country, in a village called Serhiivka, close to the port city of Odesa, just a few days after an attack on a shopping mall in Kremenchuk (Poltavska oblast) took the lives of dozens and injured more civilians Ukrainians. In Serhiivka, at least 20 people were killed—including 1 boy—and at least 38 more, 7 of them children, injured, according to verified figures from the United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine. Apart from the civilian casualties, local authorities and humanitarian partners reported that the attack had an immediate impact on 2,000 people—shockwaves caused structural damage to five residential buildings, 23 more suffering different levels of damage, and more than 130 people were immediately left homeless and in need of humanitarian assistance. The Humanitarian Coordinator for Ukraine, Osnat Lubrani, condemned the attack and reiterated the insistent call on the parties to the conflict to decisively comply with their obligations under international humanitarian law and act in accordance with the principle of precaution to minimize or avoid civilian harm, including by verifying targets.
Over the following weekend, more heavy hostilities were reported, killing and injuring an increasingly high number of civilians on both sides of the front line in Donetska and Luhanska oblasts, according to different sources on the ground. The Ukrainian Armed Forces announced on 3 July their withdrawal from the heavily damaged city of Lysychansk, the last Government-controlled urban centre in Luhanska oblast and where, according to the Governor, over 10,000 civilians remain.
Following this, fighting and hostilities reportedly moved towards the Government-controlled areas (GCA) of Donetska oblast.
The people in Sloviansk and Kramatorsk—where just two weeks ago the United Nations and partners delivered vital humanitarian assistance—have experienced a particularly hard impact, including damage to the water system of Sloviansk, according to humanitarian security reports. The intensifying hostilities prompted the mayors of both cities to appeal to the residents to evacuate immediately and find safety elsewhere. People in the towns of Bakhmut and Toretsk were also heavily affected. Across Donetska oblast GCA, the UN has received reports of dozens of houses being damaged, and access to basic services continued to be impacted, as some education and health facilities have reportedly been damaged. There have also been reports of damage to agricultural land, just before the harvest. The situation is also dire in non-Government-controlled areas (NGCA), with multiple attacks reported during the past week leaving, an unconfirmed but apparently high number of people killed and injured, and dozens of civilian infrastructure objects damaged. The bombardments in the NGCA of Donetska oblast have been particularly high since last weekend in Donetsk city, Makiivka, Oleksandrivka and Yasynuvata. Access to water in the NGCA of Donetska oblast remains limited.
While the east accounts for most of the active warfare, more missile attacks and casualties were also reported in several other regions of the country, including in eastern Kharkivska and western Khmelnytska oblasts taking a heavy toll on civilians and civilian infrastructure. The Ukrainian Government reported that some 25,000 kilometres of roads and more than 300 bridges, among other critical infrastructure across the country worth a total of US$95 billion, have so far been damaged or destroyed due to the war.
Disclaimer
- UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
- To learn more about OCHA's activities, please visit https://www.unocha.org/.