Russian drone attacks kill 13 in Ukraine after ceasefire expires

Thirteen people have been killed and at least 41 injured in a slew of Russian drone and bomb attacks across Ukraine between Tuesday and Wednesday, officials have said.

The worst-hit was the central Dnipropetrovsk region, where eight people were killed and 11 injured throughout Tuesday. One casualty was reported in the eastern Donetsk region the same day.

Russian attacks continued on Wednesday, with three people reported killed in the western Rivne region and one person in Zaporizhzhia, in the south.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said 800 drones had been launched by Russia throughout the dat and warned that missile launches could follow.

In Russia, officials said Ukrainian drones hit three industrial facilities overnight. No casualties were reported.

The latest attacks come shortly after a three-day US-brokered ceasefire expired late on Monday.

Both Russia and Ukraine reported multiple violations - mostly along the vast frontline - during the truce, but no major aerial attacks.

Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

In a post on Telegram on Wednesday morning, Dnipropetrovsk regional head Oleksandr Hanzha reported more than 30 Russian attacks on three districts throughout Tuesday.

He said two people were killed in Zelensky's hometown of Kryvyi Rih, and another six in the Synelnykove district - just south-east of the regional capital Dnipro.

"More than two dozen houses were damaged," Hanzha added.

In the north-eastern Kharkiv region, five people were reported injured and a number of residential houses damaged.

Russian drone strikes were also reported in the southern Odesa, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, as well as in Poltava - Ukraine's central region.

Writing on Telegram on Wednesday morning, Zelensky said 14 Ukrainian regions were attacked throughout Tuesday, and there were more attacks overnight.

He accused Russia of "purposely" targeting Ukraine's railway infrastructure and other civilian facilities.

Ukraine's air force said Russia launched 139 drones in the past 24 hours. It said 111 projectiles were shot down or intercepted, but recorded 20 direct hits in 13 locations.

Russian attacks continued on Wednesday, with Ukraine's Hur military intelligence warning that such strikes could be "protracted".

In a statement, Hur said that in a first wave of attacks Russia was using a "significant number of strike drones to overload Ukraine's air defence system and strike civilian targets". It added that this could be followed by massive missile strikes.

On Wednesday, three people were killed and four injured when a residential house was hit in the Rivne region, local officials said.

They added that in the Zaporizhzhia region, an elderly man was killed when a Russian guided bomb exploded nearby.

And in Kherson, nine people were wounded when a drone struck a passenger minibus.

Meanwhile, the Russian defence ministry said 286 Ukrainian drones were intercepted since Tuesday evening over 14 Russian regions and Crimea - Ukraine's southern peninsula annexed by Moscow in 2014.

The governor of the southern Astrakhan region, Igor Babushkin, said that overnight falling drone debris triggered a fire at a gas processing plant in the regional capital.

"There is no threat of air pollution," he added.

Local officials also said two industrial facilities were damaged during Ukrainian overnight attacks in the southern Krasnodar region and in the city of Yaroslavl, north-east of the Russian capital Moscow.

In recent months, Ukraine's military has intensified its strikes on key energy facilities across Russia.

Kyiv says they are legitimate targets, as they allow Russia to continue its war effort.