KYIV, Ukraine, March 28, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - Russian attacks on eastern and
southern Ukraine killed at least three people on Wednesday, officials said,
as Kyiv called for more Patriot air defence systems to battle a surge in
missile strikes.

Moscow has escalated aerial attacks on Ukraine in the past few weeks,
targeting key infrastructure -- including power stations -- in retaliation
for fatal bombardments of Russia's border regions.

In Ukraine's second largest city Kharkiv, which has been reeling from power
outages due to the strikes, aerial bombing and shelling killed at least one
person and injured 19 others, including four children, officials said.

And a 12-year-old boy was killed in a strike in the village of Borova in
Kharkiv region Wednesday evening, according to prosecutors.

President Volodymyr Zelensky urged Ukraine's allies to speed up deliveries of
warplanes and air defence systems following the strike.

"Bolstering Ukraine's air defence and expediting the delivery of F-16s to
Ukraine are vital tasks," he said in a statement on social media.

"There are no rational explanations for why Patriots, which are plentiful
around the world, are still not covering the skies of Kharkiv and other
cities," he added.

The governor of Ukraine's southern Kherson region, which is partially
occupied by Russia, said one woman had been killed in a drone attack on the
village of Mykhailivka.

"A 61-year-old local resident was fatally wounded in her own home," the
official, Oleksandr Prokudin, wrote on social media.

And in the southeastern city of Nikopol, officials said artillery fire killed
a 55-year-old man, while a ballistic missile strike on the coastal territory
of Mykolaiv left eight wounded.

- 'Little time' -

The Ukrainian air force said Russia had launched 13 Iranian-designed attack
drones overnight and that 10 were downed over the Kharkiv region, the
neighbouring Sumy region and near the capital Kyiv.

During a briefing on Wednesday, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba stressed that
Western air defences were crucial to protect Ukrainian cities from Russian
shelling.

"The peculiarity of the current Russian attacks is the intensive use of
ballistic missiles that can reach targets at extremely high speeds, leaving
little time for people to take cover and causing significant destruction,"
Kuleba said.

"Patriot and other similar systems are defensive by definition. They are
designed to protect lives, not take them," he said.

Zelensky meanwhile was in the northeastern Sumy region bordering Russia,
where he met with soldiers recovering from injuries and visited newly built
defence lines.

"I inspected trenches, dugouts, firing and command and observation posts,"
Zelensky wrote in a social media post.

"We are strengthening our defences," he said.

Ukraine has been forced onto a defensive footing in the past few months as it
struggles with ammunition shortages amid delays to a $60 billion aid package
from Washington.

Its ground forces commander warned last week Russia was gathering more than
100,000 soldiers in advance of what may be a major offensive this summer, as
Moscow seeks to press its advantage on the battlefield.

Russia meanwhile announced that its air defence systems had shot down 18
rockets near the border city of Belgorod, which has been regularly targeted
by fatal Ukrainian attacks.

The governor of Russia's Belgorod region, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said two people
were wounded during the barrage and later drone attack.