Popular Ukrainian Writer, Victoria Amelina Dies After Russia Attacks Pizza Restaurant

According to BBC, she died from her injuries after a Russian missile hit a pizza restaurant in the eastern city of Kramatorsk.

The war crimes researcher becomes the 13th person to have died in the attack.

The writers’ association PEN Ukraine said doctors “did everything they could to save her life, but unfortunately the wound was fatal”.

Human rights activists have called the attack a war crime.

Kramatorsk is under Ukrainian control but is close to Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine.

Amelina, 37, was dining with a delegation of Colombian journalists and writers in the city’s popular Ria Lounge when the missile hit. Around 60 others were injured in the attack.

She was rushed to hospital in Dnipro, but succumbed to her injuries on Friday, PEN Ukraine said.

“It is with great pain that we inform you that the heart of the writer Victoria Amelina stopped beating on 1 July,” the group said in a statement.

“In the last days of Victoria’s life, her family and friends were by her side.”

Amelina was one of Ukraine’s most celebrated young writers who started documenting war crimes after Russia’s full-scale invasion last year. She also started working with children near the frontline.