Ukraine's leader calls for tough global response against Russia after deadly strike on Kramatorsk train station

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he wants a tough global response after a missile struck a train station packed with civilians trying to escape an imminent Russian offensive, killing at least 52 people. Zelenskyy's voice rose in anger during his nightly address late Friday, when he said the strike on the Kramatorsk train station in eastern Ukraine amounted to another war crime for an international tribunal to consider.

Five children were among the dead, and dozens of people were severely injured, Ukrainian officials said.

"All world efforts will be directed to establish every minute of who did what, who gave what orders, where the missile came from, who transported it, who gave the command and how this strike was agreed," the president said.

Russia denied it was responsible for the strike and accused Ukraine's military of firing the missile as a false-flag operation so Moscow would be blamed for civilian slayings. A Russian Defense Ministry spokesman detailed the missile's trajectory and Ukrainian troop positions to bolster the argument.

Ukraine's state railway company said in a statement that residents of the country's contested Donbas region, where Russia has refocused its forces after failing to take over the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, could flee through other train stations on Saturday.

"The railways do not stop the task of taking everyone to safety," the statement on the messaging app Telegram said.

Photos taken after Friday's missile strike showed corpses covered with tarpaulins, and the remnants of a rocket painted with the words "For the children" in Russian. The specific Russian phrase has a meaning closer to "on behalf of children" or "in retaliation for an attack on children," rather than "aimed at children."