KYIV — Russian attacks on Ukraine’s Kharkiv and Dnipro regions and the Black Sea port city of Odesa killed at least two civilians, set a food factory ablaze and damaged other infrastructure, homes and commercial buildings on Saturday, regional officials said.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia had used eight missiles of various kinds and nearly 70 guided aerial bombs against communities and frontline positions during the day, after Ukraine’s air force downed 13 Shahed drones that targeted the Kharkiv and Dnipro regions overnight.
Zelenskyy said Moscow had no desire for peace. “Russia can only be forced to leave Ukraine alone,” he said in his nightly video address. A world peace summit taking place in Switzerland in June – without Russia — “must succeed,” he said.
He said Ukraine’s 110th mechanized brigade brought down a Russian Su-25 fighter-bomber over the eastern Donetsk region, one of four areas of Ukraine Moscow says it has annexed.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said on Friday Moscow had taken control of 547 sq km (211 sq miles) of the territories this year.
Oleh Syniehubov, governor of Kharkiv region, said Russian shelling killed a 49-year-old man on the street near his home in the village of Slobozhanske. An 82-year-old woman was killed and two men were injured in overnight shelling in Kharkiv city, he wrote on the Telegram app.