“Again Russia has shown that it is a terrorist state. Unfortunately, there are people under the rubble,” said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on Saturday evening.

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Russia unleashes rare daytime strikes on Ukrainian capital Kyiv in new wave of attack

Russia unleashes rare daytime strikes on Ukrainian capital Kyiv in new wave of attack

The head of state released a video showing the two-storey building completely destroyed.

Emergency workers were reportedly searching for survivors.

Zelensky said a missile struck the area between two two-storey residential buildings. There had been an air alert in the region soon before.

“The Russians will bear responsibility for everything they did to our state and people,” added Zelensky.

Earlier on Saturday, Zelensky said he believes the country is ready for a long-awaited counteroffensive to liberate its territories from Russian occupation.

“In my opinion, as of today, we are ready to do it,” he said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, which the US newspaper also published as a video on its website.

Zelensky also said Ukraine would have liked to have some more weapons for the offensive against the Russian invasion, but could not wait months more for their delivery.

“We strongly believe we will succeed,” he said, according to the newspaper’s translation. “I don’t know how long it will take.” He added that the price for success would be high.

For months there has been speculation about when the offensive would start; at times it was said in Kyiv that the operation was already under way.

Recently there have been attacks in western regions of Russia, close to the Ukrainian border, that some suggest are Kiev’s work and part of a counteroffensive that has already begun. Ukraine denies these claims.

Two paramilitary Russian volunteer battalions have repeatedly claimed responsibility for attacks involving drones and explosions in the western Russian regions of Kursk, Bryansk, Smolensk and Kaluga.

The governor of the Russian border region of Belgorod, Vyacheslav Gladkov, reported massive shelling, including with artillery, from the Ukrainian side on Saturday. This led to deaths, injuries and extensive destruction of buildings, he said.

Amid fire on the Belgorod, the head of the Wagner Group of Russian mercenaries, Yevgeny Prigozhin, accused the Russian Defence Ministry of failing.

“The ministry is not able to do anything. There is chaos in the ministry,” he said on Saturday, also referring to the faltering war effort in Ukraine.

Prigozhin is a close confidant of Russian President Vladimir Putin. He said he himself would march to the region with his troops if the Russian military does not establish order there “as quickly as possible.”

“There is already a conquest of the area going on there,” Prigozhin said. “Peaceful people are dying.” The population needs protection, he said. “We will not wait for an invitation.”

However, he said, the Russian military must provide ammunition. “Otherwise, as they say, we will be sitting on our bare arses on the frost.”

Prigozhin defended his criticism of the Russian Defence Ministry and parts of the Kremlin in a lengthy speech on Telegram. He has recently faced threats, including from Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov’s army. Prigozhin has also been asked to refrain from publicly attacking the ministry.

He has since cleared up the dispute through a phone call with Kadyrov, Prigozhin said, though adding that he refused to be muzzled.

Prigozhin said again that he agreed with Kadyrov that it would take a general mobilisation and martial law to win the war – steps that the Kremlin has so far refused to take.

However, later on Saturday, Russia’s Defence Ministry said it had expanded the number of mustering points to recruit volunteers for the war.

There are more such points and more instructors to work with candidates, the ministry said on Saturday. This would allow more contracts to be signed with citizens to serve in the war.

The number of applicants who “want to combine their lives with military service” has increased to a “significant extent,” the ministry said.

These efforts are now being organised more effectively in the Moscow region and in the Bashkir region, too, it said.

The Wagner Group are also recruiting volunteers, offering salaries the equivalent of more than US$2,000 – a figure much higher than the average wage in Russia.

Additional reporting by dpa