Russia-Ukraine war – live: Unesco sounds alarm as historic cathedral badly damaged in deadly Odesa airstrikes

Residents refuse to leave destroyed apartments after Odesa air strikeRussia struck the Ukrainian Black Sea city of Odesa again, local officials said, keeping up a barrage of attacks that has damaged critical port infrastructure in southern Ukraine in the past week.

At least one person was killed and 22 others were wounded in the attack in the early hours on Sunday.

Six residential buildings, including apartment buildings, were destroyed by the strikes, regional governor Oleh Kiper said, as well as the historic Transfiguration Cathedral, a landmark Orthodox cathedral in the city.

Svitlana Molcharova, 85, was rescued by emergency service workers.

But after she received first medical aid, she refused to leave her destroyed apartment.

“I will stay here,” she said to the emergency service worker who advised her to leave.

“I woke up when the ceiling started to fall on me. I rushed into the corridor,” said Ivan Kovalenko, 19, another resident of the building.

He came to Odesa having fled the city of Mykolaiv in search of a safer place to live after his house was destroyed.

“That’s how I lost my home in Mykolaiv, and here, I lost my rented apartment.”

In his home, the ceiling partially collapsed, the balcony came off the side of the building, and all the windows were blown out.

The Transfiguration Cathedral, one of the most important and largest Orthodox Cathedrals in Odesa, was severely damaged.

“The destruction is enormous, half of the cathedral is now roofless,” said Archdeacon Andrii Palchuk, as cathedral workers brought documents and valuable items out of the severely building, the floor of which was inundated with water used by firefighters to extinguish the fire.

Mr Palchuk said the damage was caused by a direct hit from a Russian missile that penetrated the building down to the basement and caused significant damage. Two people who were inside at the time of the strike were wounded.

“But with God’s help, we will restore it,” he said, bursting into tears.