April 15 (Reuters) - Russia attacked Ukraine overnight and throughout the day on Wednesday with hundreds of drones and missiles, targeting port infrastructure in the south, killing two people and wounding at least seven, Ukrainian officials said.
Russia launched 324 drones and three ballistic missiles overnight, starting at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, Ukraine's air force said. Air defence units shot down or neutralised 309 drones, but the missiles and 13 drones hit nine locations, it said.
An air force report issued on Wednesday evening said Russian forces had later launched 361 drones and 21 missiles during a 13-hour period ending at 10 p.m. A total of 349 drones and 20 missiles were downed or intercepted.
Twelve drone strikes and one missile strike were recorded, as were 12 instances of falling debris.
"Just over the past 24 hours, there were brutal attacks on Dnipro, Cherkasy, Kharkiv, Kryvyi Rih, Chernihiv, the Donetsk region, and Zaporizhzhia," President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a post on X, adding that cooperation to strengthen Ukraine's air defences was a priority.
"We need air defence missiles every single day – every day the Russians continue their strikes on our cities."
On Tuesday, Ukraine and Germany agreed on defence cooperation plans and Kyiv also agreed on drone production in Norway.
APARTMENT BUILDING HIT IN ODESA
A strike on an apartment block in the Black Sea port of Odesa in the early evening killed one person and injured six.
A 74-year-old woman was killed in a kiosk in a combined attack on the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, regional Governor Ivan Fedorov said on Telegram.
Fedorov said the attack also damaged a car park, business premises, and nearby residential buildings, as well as an education facility. Regional prosecutors said both drones and missiles were deployed in the attack on the city.
Three people were injured in an overnight Russian drone attack on the southeastern city of Dnipro, regional Governor Oleksandr Ganzha said on Telegram.
Ganzha said the attack also damaged a nine-storey apartment building and an administrative building, posting photos of a building with a gaping hole in one of its sides.
The new attack came after a missile strike on the city killed five and injured close to 30 people on Tuesday.
Four people sought medical treatment after an overnight drone attack in the central city of Cherkasy, the regional governor said. Dozens of private homes and cars were damaged.
An earlier drone attack on Tuesday killed an 8-year-old boy and injured 14 people, Taburets has said.
Port infrastructure on the Danube in southwestern Ukraine came under another drone attack, the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority said. The ports continue to operate, it added.
(Reporting by Anna Pruchnicka; Editing by Jacqueline Wong; Christian Schmollinger, Alison Williams, Rod Nickel and Ron Popeski)
