Russia to intensify bombardment of Ukraine ahead of US aid deliveries

Russia will expand its aerial bombardment of Ukraine, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said on Tuesday, days after billions in new US military aid for Kiev were approved in the US House of Representatives.

"We will increase the intensity of strikes against logistics centres and warehouses for Western weapons," Shoigu said at a meeting of high-ranking military officials in Moscow.

Russia has been systematically attacking key electricity, energy and water infrastructure in Ukraine, with Kiev's air defence systems running low on ammunition in recent weeks.

The US House of Representatives finally approved a $61 billion aid package for Ukraine on Saturday. The bill is expected to soon pass in the Senate before being signed into law by President Joe Biden.

Western military experts have warned that Russia could use the window of opportunity preceding the arrival of new weapons and ammunition to increase its attacks in Ukraine.

Earlier on Tuesday, nine people were injured in a Russian drone attack on the port city of Odessa, according to local officials.

"Four of them are children - 12 and 9 years old and two babies who are less than a year old," local military administrator Oleh Kiper wrote on his Telegram channel.

All four were hospitalized with moderate injuries, he said.

No deaths were reported in the attack, which hit a residential neighbourhood with low-rise buildings. Rescue workers saved dozens of people from the rubble.

The attack in Odessa followed a major strike on Monday which severely damaged a 240-metre-high television tower in the embattled eastern city of Kharkiv.

Moscow currently has the upper hand on the front line in eastern Ukraine, Shoigu said.

The village of Novomykhailivka in the Donetsk region reportedly fell to Russian troops on Monday, but Kiev has not yet confirmed the loss.

The British Ministry of Defence said Tuesday the capture of Novomykhailivka "demonstrates the slow but incremental advances Russian forces are making" and could threaten Ukraine's position in the key stronghold of Vulhedar.

The battle for the strategically located town has "caused extremely high casualties for Russian ground forces," the ministry wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Shoigu said Ukraine has lost "almost half a million soldiers" since the beginning of what Russia calls its "special military operation."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky previously put the number of Ukrainian casualties at 31,000 at the end of February.

Western estimates have placed both sides' losses - including those killed and seriously wounded - at more than 100,000 since the Russian invasion in February 2022.