Four killed by Russian missile attack on Volodymyr Zelenskyy's hometown

A woman and her 10-year-old daughter were among four people killed by a Russian missile strike on Kryvyi Rih, an industrial city known as the steel heart of Ukraine and the hometown of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

A video posted to social media by the Ukrainian leader showed smoke billowing from a hole in a nine-storey residential tower in Kryvyi Rih, which is 420 kilometres south-east of Kyiv.

The footage also showed another four-storey building, part of a university, which was almost flattened.

“This terror will not frighten us or break us. We are working and saving our people,” said Mr Zelenskyy on the Telegram messenger app.

He grew up in the city, which had a prewar population of more than 600,000.

“Tragic news. Four people have already died in Kryvyi Rih,” Serhiy Lysak, the regional governor, wrote on Telegram.

Mayor Oleksandr Vilkul said a 10-year-old girl and her 45-year-old mother were among the dead.

More than 200 rescuers were reported to be involved in trying to save as many as eight people trapped under the rubble, Mr Vilkul said.

Emergency services said at least 43 people had been wounded. Air Force spokesman Yuriy Ihnat said the attack appeared to have been carried out with ballistic missiles.

Kherson, now a front-line city in southern Ukraine after being liberated from Russian forces in November, was struck at least twice in Russian rocket attacks.

In one incident, a 60-year-old utility worker was killed and four others were wounded, the regional military administration said.

A 65-year-old motorist was badly wounded during the second strike and died on the way to hospital, regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin said on Telegram.

Meanwhile, two people were killed and four injured in Ukrainian shelling of Donetsk, the Russian-installed regional head Denis Pushilin said.

In a statement, Mr Pushilin said Ukrainian shells had hit a civilian bus. He published pictures of a burnt-out vehicle on Telegram.

Donetsk has been under Russian control since 2014, but Ukrainian troops continue to hold positions on its outskirts and the city regularly comes under artillery fire.

Gains

A senior defence official said Ukrainian forces had recaptured nearly 15 square kilometres of land over the past week from Russian troops, who occupy almost a fifth of Ukraine in its east and south.

The gains make a total of more than 200 sq km retaken in the south since the Ukrainians launched a western-backed push against Russia last month, Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar said on Telegram.

Mr Zelenskyy described Sunday as “a good day, a powerful day” at the front.

Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu told a military conference Ukraine was “desperately hurling new forces” into attacks on Russian positions, but had failed to advance and was wasting billions of dollars of western weaponry.

Peace talks

The Kremlin on Monday said it needed to find out the purpose of talks reportedly proposed in Saudi Arabia to discuss the war in Ukraine.

Saudi pan-Arab newspaper Asharq Al Awsat reported that invitations had been sent to at least 30 countries to participate in the summit, at which a peace plan will be discussed.

These include western states, Ukraine and major developing countries, but not Russia, the newspaper said.

On Monday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia needed to understand the aims of the talks and what would be discussed.

The discussions would be held on August 5 and 6 to complement Ukraine Peace Summit that was held in Copenhagen last month.

“The Ukrainian Peace Formula contains 10 fundamental points, the implementation of which will not only ensure peace for Ukraine, but also create mechanisms to counter future conflicts in the world,” said Andriy Yermak, head of Mr Zelenskyy's office in Kyiv.

Mr Yermak said the talks would be held in Saudi Arabia, without naming the location.

“We are deeply convinced that the Ukrainian peace plan should be taken as a basis, because the war is taking place on our land,” he said.