Russia Claims Six People Died In Ukrainian Artillery Attacks, Including Two Journalists

JAKARTA - Ukraine's directed artillery strike on Monday killed six people, including two journalists and their drivers on duty in Moscow-controlled Luhansk, eastern Ukraine, Russian authorities and media said.

The attack killed Alexander Fedorchak, a war journalist from Russian media Izvestiaa, as well as camera operator Andrei Panov and driver Alexander Sirkeli who worked for television channel Zvezda, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

Meanwhile, another Zvezda correspondent, Nikita Goldin, was seriously injured.

The Governor of the Luhansk Region appointed by Russia Leonid Pasechnik said Ukraine's shooting killed six people. He did not say who else was reported dead.

The attack was "Kyiv directed artillery fire," Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Maria Zakharova said in a statement on Telegram.

"The attack was carried out with high-precision MLRS ammunition on previously determined civilian vehicles with press representatives," Zakharova said without providing evidence.

Reuters was unable to independently verify Russia's report. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian Presidential Office and the Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment outside office hours.

Almost the entire Luhansk region has now been seized by Russian troops, as Moscow seeks to control the wider eastern Donbas region, one of Ukraine's most industrialized regions.

Luhansk, along with three other partially controlled Ukrainian territory of Russia, has been annexed and put into Russia, in an act condemned as an illegal act by Kyiv and its Western allies.

It is known, with the Kremlin's strict control over information about its military actions in Ukraine, Russian war correspondents have been key in spreading news about the war.

Izvestia, pro-Kremlin news media, said Fedorchak had entered Luhansk territory after reporting from the Kupiansk region in Kharkiv's neighboring region, one of the areas where Russian troops have advanced in recent months.

In Luhansk, Izvestia said on its website, Fedorchak was preparing a report on the drone crew's work when their car was hit.

"The last report released on March 23 was a story about how our troops tightened the circle around Kupiansk," said Izvestia.

The attack comes at the same time, when Russian and American negotiators met in Saudi Arabia to discuss a possible partial ceasefire in Russia's three-year war that began with a massive invasion of its neighboring country.

Earlier, a freelance reporter who worked for Izvestia died in Ukraine in January.

On Monday, another Russian journalist, a correspondent for the TASS state news agency, was injured in a Ukrainian attack on Russia's Kursk border region, Zakharova said.

Data previously provided in the war by the Journalist Protection Committee counted at least 15 journalists killed since Russia's massive invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Zakharova called on the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the United Nations to respond to the attack "appropriately".