Doctors, crater disprove Russia’s hospital airstrike misinfo

By LORI HINNANT and MSTYSLAV CHERNOV
Associated Press

LVIV, Ukraine (AP) — Accounts by three doctors at a Ukrainian maternity hospital hit by an airstrike and an analysis of the crater disprove Russian misinformation about the March 9 attack that killed a pregnant woman and her unborn child. An Associated Press team of journalists was in Mariupol the day of the airstrike and raced to the scene. Their images prompted a massive Russian misinformation campaign that continues to this day to blame Ukraine for deaths in the city. The latest effort is an interview done by Russian media with a new mother who survived the attack and cast doubt on whether it was an airstrike. But three doctors and two munitions analysts say the size of the crater, strength of the shockwave and scale of the destruction leave no doubt of an airstrike.