<div style="text-align: justify; "><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>A Russian strike on Saturday hit a store selling building materials in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, killing at least two people, its mayor said.</b></span><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“We know for sure about two dead,” Kharkiv mayor Igor Terekhov wrote on Telegram, saying that according to preliminary information the strike hit a hypermarket for construction materials in a residential area.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Kharkiv regional governor Oleg Synegubov said that “two Russian guided bombs hit a construction hypermarket” and “a fire broke out over 15,000 square meters.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Videos posted by witnesses on social media showed a huge column of black smoke billowing into the sky from the Epitsentr store, located in an area of large stores beside a car park. The chain of hypermarkets sells household and DIY goods.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“We have a large number of people missing. There are many wounded,” Terekhov wrote on Telegram.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Apparently, the attack was on a shopping center where there were many people — this is pure terrorism.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The city of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest, regularly comes under attack from Russian missiles.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Strikes on the city killed at least seven people on Thursday, local authorities said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Russia launched a ground offensive in the northeastern Kharkiv region on May 10, but Ukraine said Friday that it had managed to halt its progress. - AFP </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd/fas</div>