Russia said on Monday its forces had made important gains in eastern Ukraine while continuing to fend off a new Ukrainian offensive inside the Kursk region of western Russia, where a second day of fierce fighting was under way.

Russia said on Sunday that Ukraine had launched a counter-attack in the Kursk region, an area of western Russia from which Russian troops have been trying to eject Ukrainian forces for the past five months.

Ukrainian officials say that a Russian missile attack in the southern Ukraine city of Zaporizhzhia has killed at least 13 civilians and wounded about 30 others