At least 1,500 dead in city of Sievierodonestsk, says Mayor

The mayor of the eastern city of Severodonetsk is claiming that at least 1,500 people have been killed and about 60 percent of residential buildings destroyed.

Meanwhile Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia’s offensive in Donbas could leave the eastern region uninhabited

He also said that Moscow’s forces want to turn cities like Popasna, Lysychansk and Severodonetsk to ashes.

In the northwest of the Donbas, Shelling killed nine people in Ukraine’s second-largest city of Kharkiv on Thursday, including a five-month-old child, and wounded another 19, Zelenskyy says.

Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba stated that Kyiv will not be able to counter Russia’s offensive without more heavy weapons.

US officials said the Biden administration is considering supplying Kyiv with the m142 high mobility artillery rocket system  which  have a range of hundreds of kilometres.