KYIV: Ukraine will seek the "complete transformation" of six towns that have been badly damaged in Russia's full-scale conflict under a reconstruction programme announced by Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal on Tuesday.
Kyiv's Western partners are preparing to pour billions of dollars into Ukraine to support reconstruction efforts after 14 months of war.
Shmyhal said the towns of Borodianka and Moshchun near the capital Kyiv, Yahidine in the north, Trostianets and Tsyrkuny in the east, and Posad-Pokrovske in the south would be rebuilt "comprehensively and according to new principles" under an experimental programme
"This means that particular houses and buildings will not be rebuilt, but everything - with a system approach, new planning and a complete transformation of these settlements," he told a government meeting.
All six had suffered "terrible destruction", he said.
Shmyhal said the project was part of a broader plan to fast-track reconstruction even though the war is not over.
Ukrainian forces are expected to mount a counteroffensive in coming weeks to try to recapture other towns.
"For us it is important for Ukrainians to see this year already that reconstruction is a reality," he said.
Meanwhile, a Russian missile struck a museum in the centre of the eastern Ukrainian city of Kupiansk, killing two women and wounding 10 other people, the state emergency service said.
Rescue workers dug through mounds of rubble to retrieve the bodies after the local history museum was hit by what President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's chief of staff and the regional governor said was a Russian S-300 missile.
Anatolii Haivoronskyi, who used to work at the museum, said the museum director had been trapped under the rubble.
Yulia, a resident who gave no surname, said she had been at the post office when she heard three explosions in the morning attack.
Zelenskiy posted a video of a devastated building that had spewed out rubble and debris into the street. Its windows were smashed and a section of the wall and roof was destroyed.
Kupiansk, which had a pre-war population of 26,000, is an important rail hub which is covered by Ukrainian forces. — Reuters
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