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A Russian missile hit Kharkiv's administration headquarters.

A 30-second video footage of the missile strike has been uploaded onto social media, and verified by Reuters.

"A genocide of the Ukranian people"

The missile was launched at 8am on Mar. 1, the sixth day of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Video footage showed a car travelling in front of the building and then it was obliterated in the fireball that consumed the facade of the building after it was hit.

Kharkiv's region head Oleg Synegubov said Russia GRAD and cruise missiles have also struck Kharkiv's residential areas and the city's central square in a Telegram video, according to Reuters.

He said: "This morning the central square of our city and the headquarters of the Kharkiv administration was criminally attacked."

Reuters reported that he also said "Russian occupiers continue to use heavy weaponry against the civilian population".

Synegubov added that these Russian offensive attacks were "genocide of the Ukrainian people, a war crime against the civilian population".

At least 10 killed

He added that it was too early to know the number of casualties, but Synegubov said the city's defence was holding.

A Telegram channel, ДСНС України (State Emergency Service of Ukraine), reported that there were seven fatalities, 24 injured, and 11 hospitalised from the shelling of Kharkiv's administration building.

Ukraine's Interior ministry adviser Anton Herashchenko announced a more recent update on Telegram and said at least 10 people were killed, with at least 20 others wounded.

This was subsequently confirmed by State Emergency Service of Ukraine, reported NBC News.

Ukrainian president speaks out

Kharkiv lies near the Russian border and has a population of around 1.4 million, reported CNA.

Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky has condemned the shelling of Kharkiv's Independence Square and the "face of our Kharkiv".

He said the missile hitting the central square was "frank, undisguised terror" as there were "no military targets at the square, as well as in other residential districts of Kharkiv".

"It's a terror against the city, against Kharkiv, against Ukraine."

"Now, everything has changed" said Zelensky, who called on "countries of the world to immediately, and firmly, react to such criminal tactics by the [Russian] aggressor and declare that Russia is carrying out state terrorism".

You can watch Zelensky's response to the shelling below:

Putin accused of war crimes

Following the indiscriminate shelling of Kharkiv's city, the UK government issued a warning and said Russian president Vladimir Putin and his commanders in Ukraine could face prosecution for war crimes, reported Sydney Morning Herald.

The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Karim Ahmad Khan announced that he will launch an investigation into possible war crimes or crimes against humanity in Ukraine, reported The Guardian on Feb. 28.

The ICC added that they found "reasonable basis" to suspect alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ukraine since Russia seized the Crimea peninsula in 2014.

On the same day, CNA reported that Justice Secretary Dominic Raab, a former war crimes prosecutor, said on BBC television "there's a very real risk that they'll (Putin, Russian generals and soldiers) will end up in the dock of a court in The Hague".

Ukraine called for United Nations inquiry

Separately on Feb. 28, Ukraine has called for a United Nations inquiry into the possible war crimes committed by Russia during its military actions in Ukraine, according to Reuters.

Ukraine's request to hold an urgent debate on Russia's invasion on Mar. 3 was approved by the United Nations Human Rights Council on the same day.

A Ukrainian draft resolution will be considered at the urgent debate.

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Top image from State Emergency Service of Ukraine