KYIV, Ukraine (AP) – Russia’s drone and missile attacks on Ukraine on Saturday killed at least two people, including a 9-year-old girl, officials said, as uncertainty remains whether Kyiv diplomats will attend a new round of peace talks proposed by Moscow for early next week in Istanbul.
Russian troops launched some 109 drones and five missiles across Ukraine overnight and into Saturday, the Ukrainian air force said. Three of the missiles and 42 drones were destroyed and another 30 drones failed to reach their targets without causing damage, it said.
A 9-year-old girl was killed in a strike on the front-line village of Dolynka in the Zaporizhzhia region, and a 16-year-old was injured, Zaporizhzhia’s Gov. Ivan Fedorov said.
“One house was destroyed. The shockwave from the blast also damaged several other houses, cars, and outbuildings,” Fedorov wrote on Telegram.
Another man was killed by Russian shelling in Ukraine’s Kherson region, Gov. Oleksandr Prokudin wrote on Telegram.
Moscow did not comment on either attack.
Russia’s Ministry of Defense said Saturday that it had gained control of the Ukrainian village of Novopil in the Donetsk region, and took the village of Vodolahy in the northern Sumy region. Ukrainian authorities in Sumy ordered mandatory evacuations in 11 more settlements as Russian forces make steady gains in the area.
The new additions bring the total number of settlements under evacuation orders in Sumy, which borders Russia’s Kursk region, to 213.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said some 50,000 Russian troops had amassed in the area with the intention of launching an offensive to carve out a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory.
Elsewhere, 14 people were injured including four children after Ukrainian drones struck apartment buildings Saturday in the Russian town of Rylsk and the village of Artakovo in the western Kursk region, local acting Gov. Alexander Khinshtein said.
Andrii Yermak, a top adviser to Zelenskyy, said Friday that Kyiv was ready to resume direct peace talks with Russia in Istanbul on Monday but that the Kremlin should first provide a promised memorandum setting out its position on ending the more than three-year war.
Zelenskyy said Friday that Russia was “undermining diplomacy” by withholding the document.
“For some reason, the Russians are concealing this document. This is an absolutely bizarre position. There is no clarity about the format,” Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram.
Moscow previously said it would share its memorandum during the talks.
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