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Kremenchuk strike overshadowed the G7 summit
Summary
A missile attack on a crowded shopping centre coincided with Western pledges of further support for Ukraine.
What did the world's leading democracies offer Ukraine on 27 June 2022, and what did the day show about the need for it? The same day brought a G7 summit statement in Germany and a missile strike on a crowded mall in Kremenchuk.
At the 48th G7 summit in Germany, leaders issued a statement pledging more financial, humanitarian, military and diplomatic support to Ukraine. It followed a video in which President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on allies for more heavy weapons.
The Kremenchuk strike
On the same day, two missiles hit a crowded shopping mall in the city of Kremenchuk. As reported at the time, at least 13 people were killed and at least 50 injured. Zelenskyy said more than a thousand people were inside when the missiles struck.
Later assessments raised the toll. They put the number of dead at no fewer than 20 and the injured at no fewer than 59. They also said the attack involved two Kh-22 cruise missiles that hit the Kredmash road machinery plant and the adjacent Amstor mall in central Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, and started a fire. Russian media and officials carried conflicting accounts of what had happened.
A trip abroad
The previous day, 26 June 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin had begun a foreign trip to Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. It was his first since the invasion of Ukraine.
What the day set side by side
The pledges from the G7 and the appeal for heavy weapons came on the same day as a strike that, by Zelenskyy's account, hit a mall holding more than a thousand people. The G7 statement named financial, humanitarian, military and diplomatic support as areas of commitment. Zelenskyy's appeal singled out heavy weapons.
