Aug. 19 (UPI) -- At least four people riding a minibus in Ukraine's frontline Kherson region were killed Wednesday morning after the vehicle was hit by a Russian drone.
Kherson Gov. Oleksandr Prokudin said in an online post that five women injured in the strike in the Korabelnyi district of Kherson city were being treated in the hospital.
"This morning, the Russians hit an ordinary minibus in Kherson with a First-Person-View drone. It is clear that the bus was civilian. The brutal Russian 'safari' against our people in Kherson has long gone beyond what any normal person can imagine," said Prokudin.
He added that during the past 24 hours, nine other people had been injured in Russian strikes targeting critical infrastructure and residential areas in the province, damaging three apartment blocks, a restaurant and several cars.
"These are the realities of everyday life in Ukraine's frontline regions. While partners hesitate over additional supplies of defense equipment, the Russians have gone long beyond the bounds of what is acceptable" Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on X.
The United Nations' humanitarian chief, Tom Fletcher, just back from visiting Ukraine's Mykolaiv and Kherson regions, told BBC Radio that Kherson was coming under attack from thousands of drones each week with civilians telling him they were the targets.
Moscow insists it only attacks legitimate military and military-related targets.
Russia overran and occupied Kherson province at the start of the war in Feb. 2022, eventually annexing the province by September, but Kyiv routed Russian forces in a fall 2022 counter-offensive, recapturing around a third of its territory, including Kherson, the provincial capital.
Ukraine's Air Force said in an update on Telegram that it dealt with airborne attacks on the north, south and east of the country overnight involving two Iskander-M ballistic missiles and 65 drones and other munitions, of which 10 got past air defenses to strike their targets.
Falling debris from downed missiles and drones fell in another three locations.