Five killed in Russian attacks on Ukraine, officials say

(Reuters) -Five people, including a child, were killed in renewed Russian attacks on Ukraine, Ukrainian officials said on Friday.

Three of the victims were killed in the city of Pavlohrad after a drone strike, said Serhiy Lysak, governor of the central Dnipropetrovsk region.

“The aggressor again conducted a mass attack on the region with drones,” Lysak wrote on Telegram, adding that 11 drones were destroyed over the region.

He said that 14 people were wounded in the attack on a five-storey building, including a six-year-old boy and teenagers, aged 15 and 17. Five of the wounded remained in hospital, he added, without specifying at what time the attack took place.

“Unfortunately, there are already three dead in Pavlohrad. Among them is a child,” he said in a later update.

Donetsk regional prosecutors said separately that two people had been killed in an attack early on Friday on the settlement of Yarova, where the Russian army dropped an aerial bomb on a residential building.

Russia, which invaded Ukraine in February 2022, did not immediately comment on the attack, a day after at least 12 people were killed in strikes on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities that were criticised by U.S. President Donald Trump.

Trump is trying to secure a peace settlement to end Russia’s war in Ukraine but has threatened to walk away from peace efforts if Ukraine and Russian do not agree to a deal soon.

Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched 103 drones in overnight attacks across Ukraine, causing damage in five regions.

Ukraine’s Emergency Services said that an emergency worker had been hurt as a result of a repeat attack in Pavlohrad.

The industrial city of Pavlohrad had a pre-war population of about 100,000 people. It is an important railway hub for the Dnipropetrovsk region, connecting it to the east of the country.

As a result of the attack, city infrastructure has also been damaged, and a social institution was partially destroyed. Several cars also burned down.

The eastern city of Kharkiv also came under attack from drones, mayor Ihor Terekhov said, adding that according to preliminary information several private buildings were damaged.

(Reporting by Anna Pruchnicka; Editing by Kim Coghill, Muralikumar Anantharaman and Timothy Heritage)