Russian missile injures 13 near Ukraine's Kharkiv, prosecutors say

KYIV - A Russian missile hit residences in Balakliia in Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv region on June 1, injuring 13 people including eight children, prosecutors said.

Pictures posted online showed homes in the town south-east of Kharkiv reduced to rubble.

Reuters could not independently verify accounts from either side.

Russia denies

deliberately targeting civilians.

Thousands have been killed and injured since Russia's February 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

The city of Kharkiv and the surrounding region has been

a focal point of Russian attacks

in recent weeks.

Russian forces in May

pushed their way across the border into northern districts of the Kharkiv region

and officials say they have seized about a dozen villages.

A military spokesperson, Nazar Voloshin, told national television on June 1 that Ukrainian forces controlled 70 per cent of Vovchansk, a town 5km inside the border which

Russian troops have been trying to capture.

Prosecutors also announced that recovery operations had concluded at the site of

three missile strikes

early on May 31 in the city of Kharkiv, with a death toll of nine, most in a badly damaged apartment building. REUTERS