Ukraine said seven people were killed in overnight drone strikes by Russian forces in a city south of the capital Kiev, while Moscow accused its neighbor of using unmanned sea and air drones to attack its navy in the occupied Crimea peninsula.
The latest Russian airstrikes on energy infrastructure came hours after China’s leader Xi Jinping ended a visit to Moscow. Russian President Vladimir Putin has endorsed a Chinese peace plan that broadly supports Moscow’s position and is viewed as a non-starter by Ukraine and its western allies.
“Every time someone tries to hear the word ‘peace’ in Moscow, another order for such criminal attacks is issued there,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on Twitter on Wednesday, adding that the country from 20 in Iran-made drones and missiles was hit and shelling.
Zelenskyi paid an unannounced visit to Ukraine’s positions near the eastern city of Bakhmut, where the most grueling battle along the 600-mile frontline is being fought. According to a video released by the President’s Office, he presented state honors to several soldiers, visited a hospital and listened to reports on the military situation.
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The Ukrainian Air Force said: “Russian invaders attacked Ukraine with Iranian-made Shahed-136/131 ‘Kamikaze’ drones,” adding that 16 of them were intercepted by air defenses.
The Ministry of Emergency Situations released photos of a dormitory in Rzhyshchiv, in the Kyiv region, which it said was hit by a Russian drone.
Blasts were reported from other cities, including Zhytomyr, west of the capital, and frontline towns in the country’s eastern and southern regions, where Russian forces still occupy nearly 20 percent of the country’s territory since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion 13 months ago. A monastery in the Black Sea port city of Odessa was also hit, officials said.
The southern industrial city of Zaporizhia was hit by repeated shelling on Wednesday. Zelenskyy posted a video of a strike in a residential building in the state capital. Zaporizhzhia City Council secretary Anatoly Kurtev said one person was killed and 25 people hospitalized.
Mikhail Razvozhaev, Moscow’s top official at the Crimean port of Sevastopol, said in a Telegram post that Russian forces had “destroyed” three sea drones. “The anti-aircraft defense against an air target also worked. Warships were not damaged,” he added.
The attack on Sevastopol, home of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, came a day after Russian officials accused Ukraine of a drone strike on Dzhankoi, a railway junction town in northern Crimea.
Referring to the reported incident, Ukraine’s military intelligence service said on Tuesday that an “explosion” destroyed Kalibr cruise missiles being transported to the Black Sea Fleet. But it stopped taking responsibility for the strike and stuck to Kiev’s policy of not admitting strikes on the territory of the Russian Federation, as well as on the occupied peninsula.
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Neutralizing Russia’s use of the Black Sea Peninsula as a southern military base and staging area for attacks is key to Ukraine’s chances of liberating more south-eastern regions, according to military analysts.
Zelenskyy has vowed to liberate all of Ukraine’s lands, including Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014 before fomenting a proxy separatist war in the eastern Donbass region, and has urged allies to increase arms supplies to support another major counteroffensive .
“The success of Ukrainian forces on land, in the air and at sea brings peace closer,” Zelenskyy wrote on Twitter on Wednesday.
Additional reporting by Christopher Miller, Correspondent for Ukraine