Ukraine steps up attacks as Putin urges Russians to vote

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday urged Russians to vote for him at a “difficult” time for the country, hours before polls open and as Kyiv launched a barrage of deadly attacks on Russian border regions.

The former KGB agent is set to extend his rule by another six years this weekend in a presidential election the Kremlin says will show that the country is fully behind his assault on Ukraine.

Ahead of the vote, Kyiv has ramped up its aerial

bombardment of Russian regions just across their shared border. At least two people were killed and nine wounded in the Russian region of Belgorod Thursday, and the Russian national guard said it was fighting off attacks from pro-Ukrainian militias in Kursk — the latest in a string of border clashes.

“I am convinced: you realize what a difficult period our country is going through, what complex challenges we are facing in almost all areas,” Putin said in an address to Russians on the eve of the vote. “And in order to continue to respond to them with dignity and successfully overcome difficulties, we need to continue to be united and self-confident,” he added.

All of Putin’s major critics are dead, in prison or exile and authorities blocked the few genuine competitors who tried to stand in the March 15-17 contest. Alexei Navalny, Putin’s most high-profile opponent over the last decade, died February in an Arctic prison colony.

He was serving 19 years for “extremism” — charges widely seen as retribution for his campaigning against the Kremlin leader. Kyiv has this week launched some of its most significant aerial attacks since the start of the two-year conflict.

The governor of Russia’s Belgorod region, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said Thursday one person had been killed in an overnight drone attack. A second aerial attack killed another woman and injured several more, he said in a post on social media, without specifying what weapons had been deployed.

Pro-Ukrainian paramilitaries also claimed to be escalating attacks and incursions in Russian border regions. In a joint statement Thursday, three pro-Kyiv volunteer groups — claiming to consist of Russians who oppose the Kremlin and have taken up arms for Ukraine — called on authorities to evacuate civilians from the regions of Belgorod and Kursk. —AFP