As Russia and Ukraine continued to exchange drone attacks overnight into Saturday, the former's officials in partially occupied Ukrainian regions of Kherson and Luhansk said that Ukraine's attacks left at least 28 people dead.
Moscow-backed governor Vladimir Saldo said that an Ukranian attack on the quaint town of Sadov in the partially occupied Kherson region on Friday left at least 22 dead and wounded 15 others.
Ukrainian troops first launched a strike with a French-based guided bomb and then struck again with a HIMARS missile supplied by the US, Saldo was cited as saying by Russian news agency Tass.
He said that the second strike was intended on creating "greater number of casualties" when "residents of nearby houses ran out to help the injured".
Meanwhile, Russia-backed governor in the partially occupied region of Luhansk, Leonid Pasechnik, said on Saturday that two more bodies were pulled out from the rubble after Friday's missile attack by Ukraine.
This brought the total death toll figure to six, another Russian news agency was cited as saying.
Saturday was declared as a day of mourning in the region by Pasechnik and public events were cancelled.
A barrage of drones across Russian territory was launched by Ukraine overnight Friday, Russia's Defence Ministry said on Saturday. Reportedly 25 drones were destroyed over Russia's southern regions of Kuban and Astrakhan, the western region of Tula and the Moscow-annexed Crimean peninsula.
Air Defences for shot own Ukrainian drones for the first time over the North Ossetia region in the North Caucasus, which is around 560 miles east of the front line of Ukraine's partially occupied Zaporizhzhia, officials said.
Russian Defence Ministry said that one drone was destroyed, while regional Governor Sergei Menyailo noted that three drowns had been taken down over the region.
Meanwhile, Ukraine's Air Defence shot down 9 of the 13 Russian drones over the central Poltava region, south-eastern Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk regions, and north-east's Kharkhiv.
Serhiy Lysak, regional Governor of Dnipropetrovsk, said that these overnight drone attacks caused damage to commercial as well as residential buildings.
(With AP inputs)
