KYIV: Russian attacks on the southern city of Kherson killed two civilians on Monday, Ukrainian officials said.

Russia fired rockets and artillery shells at Kherson’s city centre on Monday afternoon, Kherson’s governor Oleksandr Prokudin said in a statement.

The strikes killed a 62-year-old woman and a 45-year-old man, he said, and wounded ten others.

A local hospital, 15 houses and eight vehicles were also damaged in the attacks.

Ukraine says Russian army still trying to encircle Avdiivka

Ukrainian troops retook Kherson from Russian forces a year ago in the last major territorial change in the 21-month conflict.

The city, on the western bank of the Dnipro river, has been subject to daily shelling attacks from Russian forces on the other side of the vast waterway.

Ukraine has been trying to push Russian troops further back from the river embankment as part of its counteroffensive launched in the summer.

Russian military bloggers reported Monday that Ukrainian troops had secured a foothold on the eastern bank of the river at the village of Krynky, around 35 kilometres (22 miles) upstream from Kherson.

This month, Ukraine’s top general Valery Zaluzhny said the conflict had ground to a “stalemate” – an assessment rejected by both President Volodymyr Zelensky and the Kremlin in Moscow.