By Dan Peleschuk
KYIV (Reuters) – President Volodymyr Zelenskiy ordered an audit of all Ukrainian air raid shelters on Friday as a rift widened with Kyiv’s mayor after the deaths of three people locked out on the street during a Russian attack.
A nine-year-old girl, her mother and another woman were killed by falling debris after rushing to a Kyiv shelter on Thursday morning and finding it was shut.
The deaths caused a public outcry and a promise of a harsh response by Zelenskiy which appears aimed at Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko, a former world champion boxer who has clashed with the president before.
Zelenskiy said he had ordered Ukraine’s strategic industries minister and his interior minister to conduct a “full audit of bomb shelters”.
Zelenskiy had said on Thursday that shelters “must be kept accessible” and that this was the responsibility of local authorities. In what appeared a veiled dig at Klitschko, Zelenskiy said he could deliver a “knockout” blow.
Klitschko acknowledged at a local committee meeting on Friday that he bore some responsibility but said others were to blame, particularly allies of the president.
He said spending on shelters in Kyiv districts, most of which are led by members of Zelenskiy’s Servant of the People party, had been “extremely unsatisfactory” and underlined that the city’s military administration is led by a presidential appointee.
Klitschko called for “common and fair responsibility” and said he may lobby for the dismissal of district heads after a review of spending on the maintenance of shelters.
“Districts of the capital are not separate principalities where you can walk around in white gloves and neglect your duties,” he said, adding that he would not tolerate “sabotage”.
In an earlier spat, Zelenskiy accused Klitschko in November of doing a poor job setting up emergency shelters to help people without power and heat.
(Reporting by Dan Peleschuk; editing by Tom Balmforth, Timothy Heritage and Nick Macfie)
