Russian attacks in Ukraine kill three, spark evacuations

Russian attacks killed at least three people in eastern and southern Ukraine on Thursday while Moscow's advances towards the industrial Dnipropetrovsk region sent residents fleeing, officials said.

AFP journalists in the frontline town of Kramatorsk in the war-battered Donetsk region saw rescue workers at the scene of a Russian attack that officials said had killed one person and wounded five more.

A 46-year-old man died from his wounds and a 16-year-old girl was among those wounded, the regional governor said on social media, adding that Russian forces had launched two glide bombs against the town.

AFP saw a cloud of black smoke rising from a burning car surrounded by debris.

A woman several hundred meters from the vehicle was crying into the telephone as emergency service workers battled the flames.

Authorities in the southern region of Kherson said separately that Russian drones had killed two civilians aged 58 and 62 who were in a moving car at the time of the attack.

The Kremlin claimed in late 2022 to have annexed both Kherson and Donetsk alongside two other eastern Ukrainian regions, despite not having full control over them.

Russian forces are advancing in eastern Ukraine through Donetsk and towards the Dnipropetrovsk region, which Russian forces have not yet managed to enter after nearly three years of fighting.

The governor of the region said a majority of residents in several villages inside Dnipropetrovsk but on the border with Donetsk had fled, fearing Russian advances.

"They made the decision to leave their homes, which are being targeted by the enemy. The evacuation is voluntary," the governor, Sergiy Lysak, wrote on social media.