What was known about the Makiivka strike by 6 January 2023?
A look back at the strike on a vocational school used as barracks in Donetsk Oblast, and the competing casualty claims that followed.
What was known about the Makiivka strike by 6 January 2023? The attack, reported on 31 December 2022, hit a vocational school building that was serving as military barracks for mobilised Russian soldiers.
Ukraine claimed that hundreds of Russian soldiers were killed or injured. Russian authorities acknowledged several casualties but suggested lower figures.
The background to the event gives a fuller picture. The strike came during the night of 31 December 2022 and 1 January 2023. It hit the building of Professional Technical School No. 19 in Makiivka, Donetsk Oblast, and was carried out by the Ukrainian Ground Forces using HIMARS rockets. The attack destroyed the building and nearby military equipment.
The claimed death tolls differed sharply. Ukrainian officials said 400 Russian troops had been killed. Russian officials first confirmed 63 dead. Two days after the strike, they raised that figure to 89.
The gap between the two accounts was the central question around the strike in the first days of January 2023.
