Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky renewed his call for more long-range weapons and air defense systems after a missile strike killed seven people, including two children.
Ukrainian officials said a Russian attack on the town of Vilniashk near the southeastern city of Zaporozhye also wounded 31 people.
Reuters reported that missile attacks across Ukraine on Saturday killed at least 11 civilians and injured 37 others.
“Our cities and communities suffer from such attacks from Russia every day,” Zelensky wrote in a post on Telegram.
But he added that there were “ways to overcome this”, including “destroying Russian missile launchers, leveraging true long-range strike capabilities and increasing the number of modern air defense systems”.
He posted photos from Vilniask, showing a large crater near a smoking building and several bodies lying on the ground.
Ukrainian Prosecutor General Andrei Kostin said two missiles hit the town, damaging infrastructure, a shop and residential buildings.
The Russian Defense Ministry has not commented publicly on the attack.
It posted a video on its Telegram channel of a missile attack on a railway it said was near a Ukrainian settlement less than six miles (10 kilometers) from Vilnius and was being used by Ukrainian forces to unload weapons and Military equipment.
Kostin also said that three villages near the front line in the eastern region of Donetsk were shelled, resulting in four deaths and seven injuries.
Western allies have provided Ukraine with some ranged weapons – including France’s Scalp Missile, Britain’s Storm Shadow and US ATACMS – as well as the US-made Patriot air defense system.
However, arms supplies from the United States, by far Ukraine’s largest arms supplier, stalled in early 2024 after Congress shelved a bill earmarking further military aid.
The bill was finally passed in April, with air defense systems and long-range missiles due to arrive on the front lines next month.
But Ukraine blamed shortages of ammunition and anti-aircraft missiles caused by the delays for the loss of lives and territory gained by Russia in the interim, while Zelensky continued to call for further support to win the war.
He thanked allies for their help on Telegram but said the decision to send more weapons “must be accelerated” because “any delay in decisions in this war means casualties.”
