Speaking to ERR from Sloviansk, in the Donbas region and to the east of Poltava ERR's Anton Aleksejev said that Tuesday's tragedy was the result of negligence on the part of the Ukrainian military.

Aleksejev said: "It's hard to find another word besides negligence. We saw this kind of a tragedy at the start of the war in the city of Mykolaiv, where a similar strike hit the naval barracks."

"At that time there were also dozens of bodies, and over a hundred people were injured."

The BBC reports that a military academy and a nearby hospital were hit and Ukraine's land forces have confirmed that military personnel were killed in the attack.

"The Poltava cadets were there at the military communications institute, so it was a logical target for the Russians," Aleksejev said.

"How we avoid this in the future needs to be asked to the leadership of the Ukrainian military. In the Ukrainian news, someone needing to pay for this negligence with their job is already being talked about," Aleksejev added.

Sloviansk, where Aleksejev and camera operator Kristjan Svirgsden have been based, has also experienced water shortages as a result of strikes.

"All the infrastructure facilities are still under Russian fire. There was no water for 48 hours, though at 8:30 p.m., it was restored," Aleksejev reported.

The BBC reports at least 51 people have been killed and 271 others injured in the strike, and many people did not have sufficient time to get to bomb shelters after the air raid alarm sounded, the BBC reports.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has vowed reprisals and has repeated calls for better air defense capabilities, so that Ukraine might defend itself better by carrying out its own long-range missile attacks.

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