Zelenskyy offers condolences to family of Reuters safety adviser

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed an attack on the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk had killed one member of a six-person Reuters team during his evening address yesterday.

“A regular city hotel was destroyed by a Russian Iskander missile, absolutely purposefully, in a thought-out way. Seven people were wounded and one died in this strike,” he said.

Zelenskyy offered his condolences to friends and family and Reuters later said Ryan Evans was killed and two Reuters journalists were injured in the strike on a hotel in Kramatorsk.

Evans, who was working as a safety adviser for the agency, was killed after a missile struck the Hotel Sapphire where he was staying as part of a six-person team on Saturday, Reuters said in a statement.

Two of the agency’s journalists were being treated in hospital; one of them was seriously injured, it said.

Evans, a former British soldier, had been working with Reuters since 2022 and advised its journalists on safety around the world including in Ukraine, Israel and at the Paris Olympics. He was 38.

Zelenskyy said the hotel was hit by a Russian Iskander missile, a ballistic missile that can strike at distances up to 500km (310 miles).

Reuters was not able to independently verify if the missile that hit the hotel was fired by Russia or if it was a deliberate strike on that building.

Zelenskyy also said that Ukraine’s forces advanced up to 3 kilometres (1.86 miles) in Russia’s Kursk region, taking control of two more settlements there.

VIDEO | Russia-Ukraine conflict intensifies: