At least 21 killed in Russian, Ukrainian long-range strikes

KYIV, July 24: At least 21 people were killed Friday in Russian and Ukrainian long-range strikes -- including at a gathering of Ukraine's defence industry just outside Kyiv and at a factory hundreds of miles east of Moscow.

Both sides have been intensifying drone and missile strikes with diplomacy on ending the four-and-a-half-year war at a standstill.

In the most deadly attack, a Russian missile strike outside the Ukrainian capital killed at least 10 people and wounded around 100, Ukraine's prosecutor general said.
Other officials and industry figures said the strike hit an arms exhibition.

Ukrainian prosecutors opened a criminal probe into the organisation of the event -- the latest Russian strike on a gathering of military and defence figures in the war.
A Russian aerial bomb also killed five people in the frontline city of Sloviansk and damaged Latvia's honorary consulate there.

"Russia has long abandoned any regard for international norms -- and for human values," Ukrainian President VolodymyrZelensky said on social media.�"AFP