Russia, Ukraine conduct airstrikes on multiple cities as war intensifies

Russia and Ukraine have conducted air attacks on multiple cities as the conflict between the neighboring countries intensifies. 

Officials from both sides said the attacks on Saturday night and Sunday had resulted in civilian casualties and damage to buildings.

Ukraine attacked the city of Sevastopol on the Crimean Peninsula with five US-supplied ATACMS missiles, killing three people, including two children, and injuring about 100 more, Russian officials said.

The Russian Defense Ministry said four of the US-delivered missiles were shot down by air defense systems and the ammunition of a fifth detonated in mid-air.

The ministry said Ukraine struck “the civilian infrastructure of the city of Sevastopol with ATACMS tactical missiles supplied by the United States and equipped with cluster warheads.”

Two people, including a two-year-old child, were killed while about a hundred people were injured by falling shrapnel, Mikhail Razvozhayev, Governor of Sevastopol said on Telegram.

Sevastopol, a Black Sea port city and naval base on the Crimean Peninsula which joined the Russian Federation in 2014, regularly comes under Kiev forces' attack but the toll from Sunday’s attack was unusually high.

Putin says Russia ramping up nuclear arsenal to preserve global balance of power

The Russian leader also said that the Kremlin is ready “for a broad international discussion of these vital issues” with NATO.

Elsewhere on Sunday, at least 30 drones were destroyed over Russia’s western region of Bryansk, which borders Ukraine, Governor Alexander Bogomaz said on Telegram. No damage was reported.

Another drone launched by Ukrainian forces on Russia’s southern town of Graivoron killed a man, the Governor of Belgorod said.

Three Ukrainian drones struck a few kilometers from the border with Ukraine, said Belgorod governor Vyacheslav Gladkov, with one hitting a car park near a multi-story block of flats.

“A peaceful civilian was killed. The man died from his wounds at the spot,” Gladkov wrote on Telegram, while three were wounded.

West’s arrogance pushing world to ‘point of no return’: Russian president

Putin has warned that the West’s “selfishness and arrogance” are pushing the world closer to a dangerous “point of no return.”

Russian air defenses have shot down an unspecified number of unmanned aerial vehicles above the Western Russian region of Smolensk, Governor Vasily Anokhin wrote on Telegram.

"Air defenses responded to an attack of Ukrainian drones over Smolensk and Yartsevo," he said in a statement.

"According to preliminary information, falling fragments caused no damage or casualties on the ground," he added.

Kiev forces also hit Russian aerial drone facilities in the southern region of Krasnodar, the Ukrainian navy reported on Telegram.

In Ukraine, two people were slightly injured and dozens of residential and other buildings were damaged in a Russian missile attack on Kiev overnight, according to the head of the regional administration.

Ukrainian Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk said on Telegram that of the three missiles launched by Russia, two had been shot down and falling debris had slightly injured two people who did not require hospitalization.

Head of the Kiev region’s administration, Ruslan Kravchenko, said on Telegram that six multistory residential buildings, more than 20 private houses, as well as a gas station and a pharmacy had been damaged.

"Over the past day, the enemy has been active in the Kharkiv axis. The Russians launched a missile strike and 20 airstrikes involving 35 gliding bombs in the Kharkiv axis. Seventeen of those targeted Lyptsi alone. Also, the Russians carried out 23 kamikaze drone attacks and more than 360 strikes involving other types of weapons," the spokesman said.

Kremlin says NATO chief’s nuclear weapons remarks are an 'escalation'

Kremlin says NATO chief’s latest nuclear weapons comments constitute an “escalation of tensions.”

Also on Sunday, the head of the Russian lower house of Parliament’s defense committee, Andrei Kartapolov, warned the US-led Western adversaries fighting a proxy war against Russian troops that the nation's lawmakers could reduce the decision-making time stipulated in its official policy for the use of nuclear weapons.

“If we see that the challenges and threats increase, it means that we can correct something in [the doctrine] regarding the timing of the use of nuclear weapons and the decision to make this use,” RIA quoted Kartapolov as saying.

Moscow has already warned the Western alliance that Washington was taking the Ukraine conflict to the point of nuclear warfare by giving Kiev an unending supply of weapons and providing long-range missiles.

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