AFP, Kyiv

Ukraine yesterday said four people were killed and dozens injured as Russia launched a new wave of air strikes in the centre and east of the country.

“A Russian aerial bomb killed three civilians in Odradokamyanka -- two women and a man. Four local residents were injured,” Interior Minister Igor Klymenko said, calling the strike in the southern region of Kherson a “war crime”.

Odradokamyanka is about 60 kilometres upstream of Kherson city and lies on the west bank of the Dnipro river. In the central city of Kryvyi Rig, President Volodymyr Zelensky’s hometown, a missile attack on a police building killed a policeman, Klymenko had said earlier.

“Rescuers of the State Emergency Service pulled out three more from under the rubble. They are in serious condition,” he said.

Photos he shared from the scene showed smoke spewing from the ruins of the building as rescue workers carried an injured person to an ambulance. Over 40 people were injured in the city, local officials said.

At least three people were injured after Russia also struck the city of Sumy in northeast Ukraine, officials said, while one man was injured by a rocket attack on Zaporizhzhia in the southeast.

“Over the past 24 hours, 93 enemy attacks on 29 towns and villages of the Zaporizhzhia region have been recorded,” said Yuriy Malashko, head of the local administration.

The Ukrainian foreign ministry yesterday criticised a vote organised by Moscow in four regions it claims to have annexed -- Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson -- as well as Crimea.

“By organising fake elections in the Ukrainian regions and Crimea, the Kremlin continues to delegitimise the Russian legal system,” the foreign ministry said, calling on partners to “condemn the worthless and arbitrary actions of Russia and not to recognise the legitimacy of any ‘administration’.”

Meanwhile, the first 10 Leopard 1 tanks donated by Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands have arrived in Ukraine and more are on their way, Denmark’s armed forces said yesterday.

The three countries announced in February that they would donate 100 of the German-made tanks in the “coming months”.

“The first 10 tanks have been sent to Ukraine. And more are on the way,” the Danish armed forces said in a statement. “A further 10 tanks have been delivered from the factory.”

Danish troops in Germany are training Ukrainian forces to use the vehicles, the army added.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said yesterday Ukraine was finding it harder and slower to secure sanctions on Russia and weapon supplies to help fend off Moscow’s forces.

Speaking at a conference in the Ukrainian capital, he said Ukraine’s three-month-old counteroffensive would make faster gains in the south and east if Kyiv’s military received more powerful weapons.

“The war is slowing down. This is true, we recognise this. All the processes are becoming harder and slowing down: from sanctions to the delivery of weapons,” he said in comments from the conference that were posted on his website.