At least nine people were killed in Russia overnight in Ukrainian attacks, while Russian strikes hit a hospital in Kyiv and claimed at least three lives in southern Ukraine, officials on both sides said.
The exchange came after a week of US-led efforts to end the war, during which Russian President Vladimir Putin showed no sign of softening his uncompromising demands.
Russia said today that its forces had intercepted nearly 1,200 Ukrainian drones overnight, describing the barrage as one of the largest launched by Kyiv.
Ukraine has defended its retaliatory strikes as a response to Russia’s relentless attacks on Ukrainian cities, while also seeking to disrupt the energy revenues that help fund Moscow’s war effort.
Four people were killed in a Ukrainian drone strike on an industrial area in the southern Volgograd region, local authorities said. The zone is home to an oil refinery and a chemical factory.
Another person died in the Bryansk border region, which has come under repeated fire.
A woman stands in a damaged room of the Kyiv hospital following the attack
In Ukraine, authorities said a separate overnight Russian assault set a hospital on fire.
The World Health Organization (WHO) reported in August that more than 3,200 medical facilities in Ukraine had been damaged since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in 2022.
Three people, including a 17-year-old boy, were killed in the southern regions of Odesa and Zaporizhzhia.
The latest deaths were reported as US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner held hours of talks with President Putin in Moscow yesterday before travelling to Dublin for a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Mr Putin refused to surrender territory captured by Russian forces and warned that any foreign peacekeeping force deployed to Ukraine would amount to a “continuation of the war”, making its members “legitimate targets” for Russia’s army.
Separately, Russia’s Investigative Committee, which handles major crimes, said it had opened an investigation into a car explosion in Moscow. Russian media said the vehicle belonged to an exiled Ukrainian political aide.
Investigators at the scene of the car explosion in Moscow
Russian media identified the car’s owner as Sergei Zavorotniy, a former spokesperson for ex-Ukrainian prime minister Mykola Azarov. Mr Azarov has lived in Russia since leaving Ukraine during anti-government protests in 2014.
Russian newspaper Kommersant reported that Mr Zavorotniy was taken to hospital.
The blast is the latest in a string of apparent assassination attempts carried out inside Russia.
Yesterday, investigators said a member of the Russian military was killed when the car he was driving exploded in St Petersburg.
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