KYIV, Ukraine (AP) – A day after Moscow suffered a tragic symbolic defeat with the loss of its Black Sea Fleet flagship, Russia’s Defense Ministry on Friday vowed to step up rocket attacks on the Ukrainian capital in response to alleged attacks. “Ukraine ‘s diversions to Russian territory.”
The threat of intense attacks in Kyiv came after Russian authorities accused Ukraine of launching airstrikes on apartment buildings in Bryansk, an area bordering Ukraine, and injuring seven people.  Authorities in another Russian border area also reported Ukrainian bombing on Thursday.
Life in Kyiv is gradually returning to normal after Russia failed to occupy the capital and withdrew its troops to northern Ukraine to focus on a concentrated offensive in the east of the country.  A new bombing could bring the city’s residents back to shelters at subway stations and the constant mourning of air raid sirens.
Ukrainian officials have not confirmed targets in Russia, and reports from Russian authorities could not be independently verified.  However, Ukrainian officials claimed that their forces had hit a key Russian warship with missiles on Thursday.  If true, the claim would represent a significant victory.
The Moskva cruiser with a guided missile, so named after the Russian capital, sank while being towed to the port after being severely damaged under conditions that remained in dispute.  Moscow has recognized a fire on the ship but no attack.  US and other Western officials could not confirm what caused the blaze.
Moskva had the capability to carry 16 long-range cruise missiles, and its removal reduces Russia’s firepower in the Black Sea.  The loss of the warship in an invasion already widely regarded as a historic blunder was also a symbolic defeat for Moscow as its troops regrouped for an attack on eastern Ukraine after retreating from much of the north.
In the early days of the war, Moskva’s crew reportedly called on Ukrainian soldiers stationed on the Black Sea island of Snake to surrender in a confrontation.  In a widely circulated recording, a Ukrainian soldier responded by saying, “Russian warship, go (insultingly) yourself.”
The Associated Press has not been able to independently verify the Snake Island incident, but Ukraine and its supporters see it as an iconic moment of contempt.  The country recently unveiled a stamp in her honor.
If Ukraine struck Moskva with missiles, the cruiser probably represents the largest warship since the 1982 Falklands War, when a similar cruiser called the ARA General Belgrano was torpedoed by a British submarine with more than 300 submarines. .  .
In his speech Thursday night, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Ukrainians that they should be proud to have survived 50 days of Russian attack when the invaders “gave us a maximum of five.”
Describing the ways in which Ukraine defended itself from the attack, Zelensky said “those who have shown that Russian warships can move away, even if they are at the bottom” of the sea.  It was his only reference to Moscow.
News of the flagship overshadowed Russian claims of progress in the southern port city of Mariupol, where Moscow forces have been fighting Ukrainians since the early days of the invasion in some of the fiercest fighting – at horrific cost to civilians.
The small number of Ukrainian defenders in Mariupol is resisting a siege that has trapped more than 100,000 people in desperate need for food, water and heating.  David Beasley, executive director of the UN World Food Program, told the AP in an interview on Thursday that people were “starving to death” in the besieged city.
The mayor of Mariupol said this week that more than 10,000 civilians had been killed and that the death toll could rise to more than 20,000.
The capture of Mariupol is crucial for Russia because it will allow its forces in the south, which came through the annexed Crimean peninsula, to fully connect with troops in the Donbas region, the eastern industrial heart of Ukraine and the target of the impending attack.
The Russian military continues to move helicopters and other equipment in place for such an effort, according to a senior U.S. defense official, and is likely to add more ground combat units soon.  But it is still unclear when Russia can launch a full-scale campaign in Donbas.
Moscow-backed separatists have been fighting Ukraine in the region since 2014, the same year Russia occupied Crimea.  Russia has recognized the independence of the rebel areas in Donbas.
Maksym Marchenko, governor of the Odessa region, said Ukrainian forces had hit Moscow with two Neptune missiles and caused “serious damage”.
The Russian Defense Ministry said that ammunition on the aircraft was fired as a result of fire, without mentioning what caused the fire.  He said the “main missile weapons” had not been damaged and that the crew, which usually numbered about 500 people, had left the ship.  It was not clear if there were any casualties.  In addition to cruise missiles, the warship also had air defense missiles and other artillery.
Neptune is an anti-ship missile recently developed by Ukraine based on an older Soviet design.  The launchers are mounted on trucks near the coast and, according to the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, can hit targets up to 280 kilometers (175 miles) away.  This would have put Moskva in range, based on where the ship was when the fire started.
Launched as Slava in 1979, the cruiser saw service in the Cold War and during the conflicts in Georgia and Syria and assisted in conducting scientific research in peacetime with the United States.  During the Cold War, it carried nuclear weapons.
British defense officials say the loss of Moskva is likely to force Moscow to change the way its naval forces operate in the Black Sea.  In a post on social media on Friday, the UK Department of Defense said the ship, which returned to operational service last year after a major overhaul, “played a key role both as a command boat and as a defense hub”.
The sinking “means that Russia has now suffered damage to two major navies through the invasion of Ukraine, with the first being the Russian Saratov Alligator-class cargo ship on March 24.”  “Both events are likely to lead Russia to reconsider its position on the Black Sea.”
On Thursday, other Russian ships in the northern Black Sea moved further south after the Moscow incident, a senior US defense official said on condition of anonymity to discuss internal military assessments.
While the United States has been unable to confirm Ukraine’s claims that the warship struck, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan called it “a major blow to Russia.”
“They had to choose between two stories: One was that they were just incompetent and the other was that they were attacked, and neither is a particularly good outcome for them,” Sullivan told the Washington Economic Club.  .
Russia invaded on February 24 and may have lost thousands of fighters.  The conflict has killed countless Ukrainian civilians and forced millions more to flee.
It has also pushed up prices in grocery stores and petrol pumps, while dragging the global economy.  The head of the International Monetary Fund said on Thursday that the war had helped the agency downgrade economic forecasts for 143 countries.
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Associated Press reporters around the world contributed to this report.