(Bloomberg) -- At least ten people died in a Russian strike on the eastern Ukrainian town of Pokrovsk, hours after Kyiv said it destroyed a Russian military command post in western Crimea. 

Five children were among those killed when residential buildings were hit with S-300 long-range surface-to-air missiles, according to the head of the Donetsk regional administration. Another eight people were injured. Rescue and recovery efforts are underway. 

“The blow of the Russians was simply on ordinary residential buildings, on private houses,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in his nightly address to the nation. 

Saturday is Orthodox Christmas Eve in Russia and Ukraine, although many Ukrainians have switched to celebrating Christmas on Dec. 25. 

Pokrovsk, which had a pre-war population of more than 60,000, lies west of towns including Avdiyivka in the Donetsk region, where Ukrainian and Russian troops have been fighting for months. It suffered at least two previous missile attacks in the autumn. 

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Earlier on Saturday, Ukraine’s air forces commander said Kyiv’s troops destroyed a Russian command post at the Saky air base in western Crimea. The claim couldn’t be independently verified.

Mykola Oleshchuk, in a Telegram post, thanked Ukrainian soldiers for “wonderful work,” without specifying the timing of the attack or providing other details.

The reported strike followed Ukraine’s recent missile attacks on the eastern Crimean port of Feodosia, destroying the large landing ship “Novocherkassk,” and on western Yevpatoriya and southwestern Sevastopol. 

Read more: Putin Risks Losing Vital Naval Hub as Ukraine Strikes in Crimea 

 Russia’s defense ministry said in a statement that it “intercepted and destroyed” four missiles over the Crimean peninsula early Saturday morning, after downing 36 drones a day earlier.

Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed from Ukraine in 2014, has been the target of regular Ukrainian drone and missile attacks for months. 

Ukraine is challenging Russia’s naval superiority in the region despite lacking warships of its own. The assaults have forced Russia to move its ships further from harm’s way, and have allowed Kyiv to successfully operate a shipping corridor in the Black Sea in recent months. 

That’s kept grain exports moving even after Russia pulled out of the United Nations-backed Black Sea grain deal that had guaranteed safe passage for crops.  

(Recasts with strike on Pokrovsk)

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