KYIV: Russian attacks on Ukraine’s southern region of Kherson on Monday killed three civilians and injured 15, including a two-month-old child, officials said.

Two were killed — a 62-year-old woman and a 45-year-old man — in a “massive” Russian attack of rocket and artillery fire on the city centre in the early afternoon, Kherson’s governor Oleksandr Prokudin said in a statement.

Earlier in the day a Russian artillery strike hit a car in the city’s suburbs, killing a man and injuring a two-month-old girl when the vehicle caught fire, Roman Mrochko, head of the Kherson city military administration said.

“At noon, Russians … fired artillery at a car in which a girl and her family were returning from a medical examination,” he said in a post on Telegram.

Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska posted a video on social media showing a child with blood on its head and clothes being taken to a medical facility by first responders. “This happens in our cities daily because of brutal attacks” by Russia, she said.

In total, 15 people were injured in strikes on the Kherson region, Mrochko said. There was no comment from Russia’s defence ministry on the incidents.

Ukrainian troops retook Kherson from Russian forces a year ago in the last major territorial change in the 21-month conflict.

The city, on the western bank of the Dnipro river, has been subject to daily shelling attacks from Russian forces on the other side of the vast waterway.

Ukraine has been trying to push Russian troops further back from the river embankment as part of its counteroffensive launched in the summer. Russian military bloggers reported that Ukrainian troops had secured a foothold on the eastern bank of the river at the village of Krynky, around 35 kilometres upstream from Kherson.

Published in Dawn, November 14th, 2023