Russia, Ukraine accuse each other of overnight air attacks on border regions

Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of overnight air attacks on their border regions.
Ukrainian officials said two people died and four were injured in the Sumy region, and Russia said three civilians were injured in Belgorod.
Two children were among those injured in Sumy, the military administration of the northeastern Ukrainian region said on Sunday on the Telegram messaging app. Several residential houses and cars were damaged, it said.
Across the border, in Russia’s southwestern region of Belgorod, three civilians, including two children were injured in Ukraine’s air attack, Vyacheslav Gladkov, the governor of the region, said on Telegram.
He said two residential buildings were destroyed and more than 15 buildings in total were damaged.
The Russian defence ministry said on Telegram that it destroyed two Ukraine-launched drones over Belgorod overnight.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports.
Both Sumy and Belgorod regions have been subject to frequent attacks. Both sides deny targeting civilians, saying the attacks are aimed at destroying each other’s infrastructure critical to war efforts.
Thousands of civilians have died in the war, which Russia started with full-scale invasion on Ukraine in February 2022. Millions of Ukrainians have also been displaced, while their cities and villages have become piles of rubble.
In the east, a Russian offensive toward the Ukrainian town of Pokrovsk, which has become a focal point of the war in recent months, has stalled along one key section of the front for more than a week, even as advances continued elsewhere, soldiers fighting in the area said.
Battlefield maps based on open sources such as satellite images and videos posted online also showed the halt.
Still, the fighting in villages and fields east of the town, which is a logistical hub for Ukraine’s defence of the eastern Donbas region, remains fluid, and there was no indication that the large Russian force gathered in the area had abandoned its goal of advancing toward the town.
In Ukraine, president Volodymyr Zelenskiy appointed on Sunday former arms production minister Oleksandr Kamyshin as an external adviser for strategic issues, a decree published on the presidential website said.
Mr Kamyshin, who was the minister for strategic industries and oversaw arms production, resigned last week as part of a Ukrainian government shake-up at a critical juncture in the war with Russia.
Mr Zelenskiy said Ukraine needed “new energy” and ordered the biggest government reshuffle since the start of Russia’s invasion in February 2022.
Last week the Ukrainian parliament voted to appoint nine new ministers including the foreign minister and two deputy prime ministers. – Agencies