Death toll from missiles on Ukraine town rises to 17

ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine - At least 17 people including a child died when seven Russian missiles struck the industrial town of Zaporizhzhia in southern Ukraine, the Ukrainian authorities said Saturday.

The missiles struck before dawn on Thursday, with three landing in the town center, just 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the artillery battles of the southern front.

"In total, 17 people were killed," Ukraine's State Emergency Service said on Telegram, adding that one of them was a child.

The toll has repeatedly risen since an initial tally of one dead. Earlier on Saturday, it had stood at 14.

A five-storey residential building on the main street was almost razed to the ground.

President Volodymyr Zelensky lashed out on Telegram saying Zaporizhzhia "is subjected to massive rocket attacks every day... (it's a) deliberate crime".

The Ukrainian-controlled city is located in the eponymous Zaporizhzhia region, also home to the Russian-occupied nuclear plant that has been the site of heavy shelling.

Moscow claims to have annexed the region even though its forces do not control all of it.

Ukraine said at least 30 people were killed last week when a convoy of civilian cars in the Zaporizhzhia region was shelled in an attack Kyiv blamed on Moscow.

Agence France-Presse

CIA warns desperate Putin poses nuclear threat

WASHINGTON — Russia's setbacks in its invasion of Ukraine could lead President Vladimir Putin to resort to using a tactical or low-yield nuclear weapon, CIA director William Burns said Friday.

"Given the potential desperation of President Putin and the Russian leadership, given the setbacks that they've faced so far, militarily, none of us can take lightly the threat posed by a potential resort to tactical nuclear weapons or low-yield nuclear weapons," Burns said during a speech in Atlanta.

The Kremlin said it placed Russian nuclear forces on high alert shortly after the assault began Feb. 24, but the United States has not seen "a lot of practical evidence" of actual deployments that would cause more worry, Burns added, speaking to students at Georgia Tech university.

"We're obviously very concerned. I know President Biden is deeply concerned about avoiding a third world war, about avoiding a threshold in which, you know, nuclear conflict becomes possible," said Burns.

Russia has many tactical nuclear weapons, which are less powerful than the bomb the United States dropped on Hiroshima during World War II.

Russian military doctrine features a principle called escalate to de-escalate, which would involve launching a first strike nuclear weapon of low yield to regain the initiative if things go badly in a conventional conflict with the West.

But under this hypothesis, "NATO would intervene militarily on the ground in Ukraine in the course of this conflict, and that's not something, as President Biden has made very clear, that's in the cards."

Recalling that he once served as US ambassador to Russia, Burns had very harsh words for Putin, calling him an "apostle of payback" who over the years "has stood in a combustible combination of grievance and ambition and insecurity."

"Every day, Putin demonstrates that declining powers can be at least as disruptive as rising ones," Burns said.

Agence France-Presse