ODESA, Ukraine, March 15, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - Russian missiles pounded Ukraine's
Black Sea port city of Odesa on Friday, killing more than a dozen people
including rescue workers in an attack President Volodymyr Zelensky described
as "vile".

AFP journalists on the scene saw bodies covered by blankets strewn on the
street, while images from officials showed exhausted emergency service
workers smeared with blood and dirt dousing flames and treating wounded
colleagues.

Local authorities said Russian aerial bombardments struck residential
buildings, ambulances and a gas pipeline, leaving at least 20 people dead and
wounding another 73 people, including rescuers.

Maria Slyzovska, who witnessed the attack, said the first strike rocked her
mother's home leaving "everything broken" before the second missile hit.

"There were a lot of people there. There was blood and ambulances. We all
live in the realities of this Russian roulette," she told AFP.

Zelensky said Russian forces had launched a type of attack known as a double-
tap strike on the port hub, with the second projectile ploughing into rescue
workers at the scene.

City officials said Moscow targeted Odesa with Iskander missiles launched
from the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Russia in 2014.

"Russian terror in Odesa is a sign of weakness of the enemy, which is
fighting Ukrainian civilians at a time when it cannot guarantee security for
people on its own territory," said presidential aide Andriy Yermak.

- Kyiv, Moscow exchange barrages -

There was no immediate comment on the strikes from Russia, whose forces have
routinely targeted the transport hub with drones and missiles.

The strikes came on the first day of presidential elections in Russia, which
is also hosting the vote in several occupied regions of Ukraine, angering
Kyiv.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres as well as more than 50 member states
slammed Moscow for holding the vote in parts of Ukraine, with Guterres saying
that the "attempted illegal annexation" of those regions has "no validity"
under international law, according to spokesman Stephane Dujarric.

Russian deputy UN ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy said he would not comment on
criticisms regarding "the domestic affairs of our country."

Friday's attack was just the latest in a series of fatal barrages between
Kyiv and Moscow, as polls opened across Russia.

Kyiv said that a Russian drone strike killed two people in the central
Ukrainian region of Vinnytsia, and that shelling on the frontline
Zaporizhzhia region killed one woman.

National police said that Russia had attacked the Vinnytsia region, more than
400 kilometres (250 miles) from the frontlines, with drones, leaving a 52-
year-old man and his 53-year-old wife dead.

In the southern Zaporizhzhia region, which Moscow claims to have annexed and
partially controls, a 76-year-old woman was killed when fragments of a
Russian shell hit her in her garden, Ukrainian Governor Ivan Fedorov said.

- 'Trying to break through' -

Moscow-installed officials in the Russian-held city of Donetsk meanwhile said
a "barbaric" Ukrainian attack on a residential area had killed three
children.

"Three children died. A girl born in 2007, a girl born in 2021, and a boy
born in 2014," Alexey Kulemzin, the Russian-appointed mayor of Donetsk, wrote
on Telegram.

Russia also said Ukraine launched drone and artillery attacks on areas closer
to the countries' shared border.

The governor of Russia's Belgorod region, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said in a post
on Telegram: "The town of Grayvoron came under Ukrainian army shelling."

"There is a dead man. He is a member of our territorial self-defence unit,"
he said.

Gladkov later added another man had been killed and two more injured by
shrapnel in shelling of Belgorod city.

The uptick in attacks on Russia's border regions come after its forces last
month captured the city of Avdiivka, just a few kilometres north of Donetsk.

It said pushing Ukrainian forces back would help protect residents of areas
under its control from shelling.

The head of Ukraine's army said Friday that Russia had launched a wave of
attacks to try to advance further in the area.

"The enemy has concentrated its main efforts and has been trying to break
through ... for several days in a row," Ukrainian commander-in-chief
Oleksandr Syrsky said in a statement after visiting front lines around
Avdiivka.