KYIV: Russia killed a journalist from the US-backed broadcaster Radio Liberty in a missile attack on Kyiv during a visit to the Ukrainian capital by the secretary-general of the United Nations, the broadcaster said on Friday.
Prague-based Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) said the body of producer Vira Hyrych had been found on Friday morning in rubble after Thursday’s attack destroyed the bottom two floors of a residential building. It said Hyrych had worked for Radio Liberty since 2018.
“She was going to bed when a Russian ballistic missile hit her apartment in central Kyiv. Russia’s barbarism is incomprehensible,” Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Oleg Nikolenko said. “We call on media organizations to condemn the murder of Vira and all other innocent Ukrainians.”
US-funded RFE/RL, which has covered the former Soviet Union since the Cold War, is one of the main remaining Russian-language sources for news outside Kremlin control, since Moscow effectively shut all independent media within Russia following its invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.
“The editorial board of Radio Liberty expresses its condolences to the family of Vira Hyrych and will remember her as a bright and kind person, a true professional,” the broadcaster said in a statement.
In Kyiv, workers were cleaning up rubble in the residential area hit by the missiles.
“Kyiv is still a dangerous place and Kyiv is still the target of Russians, of course. The capital of Ukraine is the goal and they want to occupy it,” Mayor Vitali Klitschko said, supervising the cleanup before the body of Hyrych was found.
The missiles hit the capital during a visit on Thursday by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov called it “an attack on the security of the Secretary-General and on world security”.
Ukraine acknowledged on Friday it was taking heavy losses in Russia’s assault in the east, but said Russia’s losses were even worse, as US President Joe Biden called on Congress to send as much as $33 billion to help Kyiv withstand the attack.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy praised Biden’s offer of massive help, which amounts to nearly 10 times the aid Washington has sent so far since the war began on Feb. 24.
Having failed in an assault on Kyiv in the north of Ukraine last month, Russia is now trying to fully capture two eastern provinces known as the Donbas.
‘COLOSSAL LOSSES’
Ukraine has acknowledged losing control of some towns and villages there since the offensive began last week, but says Moscow’s gains have come at a massive cost to a Russian force already worn down from its earlier defeat near the capital.