Two killed in Russian attacks on Ukraine before possible talks in Turkiye

At least two people have been killed in Ukraine as a result of Russian drone and missile attacks on Ukraine, according to officials, as Ukraine ordered the evacuation of 11 more Sumy-bordering Russian-area villages.

According to the Ukrainian air force, 109 drones and 42 drones were shot down in Ukraine on Friday and overnight, according to an estimate from the Russian military. Thirty other drones failed to reach their targets without causing any harm.

The attacks occurred as the world was unsure about Kyiv’s participation in a new round of peace talks in Istanbul for the first time starting this week.

According to Zaporizhia’s governor Ivan Fedorov, a child was killed in a rocket attack on Saturday in the front-line village of Dolynka in the Zaporizhia region and another was hurt in the same attack.

“One home was destroyed,” he said. Fedorov wrote on Telegram that the blast’s shockwave also caused damage to a number of other homes, cars, and outbuildings.

Governor Oleksandr Prokudin posted a tweet claiming that a man was killed by Russian shelling in the Kherson region of Ukraine.

Both attacks were not addressed by Moscow.

Authorities in the Sumy region of Ukraine reported that they were evacuating 11 villages that were located about 30 kilometers (19 miles) away from the Russian border.

The regional administration stated on social media that the decision was made in light of the ongoing threat to civilian life caused by border community shelling.

According to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, about 50 000 Russian troops are stationed in the area in an effort to establish a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory.

Oleksandr Syrskii, the country’s top military commander, claimed on Saturday that the main offensive against Russia was being conducted in Pokrovsk, Torets, and Lyman in the Donetsk and Sumy border regions.

Moscow has repeatedly refuted Syrskii’s claim that Ukrainian forces are still occupying the Kursk region of Russia.

Washington called on both countries to end the three-year war, so the evacuations and attacks came just two days before a potential meeting between Kyiv and Moscow in Istanbul.

Russia has confirmed that it will send a delegation, but Kyiv has not yet accepted the proposal, warning that negotiations would not succeed unless the Kremlin had agreed to terms of peace in advance.