Multiple explosions apparently caused by missiles struck the western Ukrainian city of Lviv early Monday as the country was bracing for an all-out Russian assault in the east.
Regional governor Maksym Kozytsky said the attack killed six people and wounded another eight.
He said there were four strikes, three of which hit military infrastructure facilities and one struck a tire shop.
Hours earlier, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy vowed to “fight absolutely to the end” in strategically vital Mariupol where the ruined port city’s last known pocket of resistance is holed up in a sprawling steel plant laced with tunnels.
With missiles and rockets battering various parts of the country, Zelenskyy accused Russian soldiers of torture and kidnappings in areas they control.
The fall of Mariupol, which has been reduced to rubble in a seven-week siege, would give Moscow its biggest victory of the war. But a few thousand fighters, by Russia's estimate, were holding on to the giant, 11-square-kilometer Azovstal steel mill.
“We will fight absolutely to the end, to the win, in this war,” Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal vowed Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” He said Ukraine is prepared to end the war through diplomacy if possible, “but we do not have intention to surrender.”