Ukraine: Two Dead, Including a 9-Year-Old Girl, in Russian Strikes on Kherson and Zaporizhzhia

Two people, including a young child, lost their lives overnight from Friday to Saturday (May 31, 2025) in new nocturnal Russian attacks in the Kherson and southern regions of Ukraine, according to local authorities. In the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine, a 9-year-old girl was killed and a 16-year-old boy was injured when static targets were bombed in a village near the front line, reported Ivan Fedorov, head of local authorities via Telegram. In the city of Kherson, a 66-year-old man was killed in a bombing in the Dnipropetrovsk neighborhood, also reported by regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin through Telegram. Russian strikes also injured one person in Kharkiv (northeast), according to local authorities. On the Russian side, ten people were injured in Ukrainian drone attacks in the Kursk region during the night, announced interim regional governor Alexander Hinshstein via Telegram. Diplomatic efforts to end the war in Ukraine, which erupted when Russian armed forces invaded in February 2022, have intensified recently but are hindered by distrust between Moscow and Kyiv, who blame each other for the lack of progress. Moscow proposed new direct talks with Kyiv on Tuesday in Istanbul, following a first not particularly fruitful meeting on May 16. The Ukrainian side has yet to confirm whether they will send a delegation.