Ukraine war: Zelenskyy's home town struck, anger over 'blood money' claims

The strikes were among multiple Russian attacks across the country overnight, officials said. 

Meanwhile, Moscow is trying to strengthen its position politically with local elections in areas it has illegally annexed, including some it still does not control. Ukraine's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it does not recognise the "fake elections."

The strikes came days after 16 people were killed in a Russian attack on a market in eastern Ukraine.

Ten buildings were damaged in the attack on Zelenskyy's home town of Kryvyi Rih on Friday. 

Three people pulled from the rubble were in serious condition, according to Ihor Klymenko, Ukraine's minister of Internal Affairs. Photos posted by Klymenko on Telegram showed a building on fire, burnt timbers and emergency services evacuating the injured.

Three people were also killed Friday after a Russian bomb struck the village of Odradokamianka in the Kherson region of southern Ukraine, Klymenko said.

Also on Friday, a funeral was being held for an 18-year-old who was among 16 people killed Wednesday in a Russian attack on a market in Kostiantynivka in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region. 

The attack, which wounded 33 others, turned the market into a fiery, blackened ruin.

The European Union's executive branch strongly criticised the bloc's representative in Austria for accusing the country of paying "blood money" to Russia for gas supplies and said on Friday he had been ordered back to Brussels.

EU representative Martin Selmayr said during an event on Wednesday that Austria continues to get 55% of its gas from Russia — but no one, he noted, is out on Vienna's central Ringstrasse boulevard to protest that.

"That surprises me, because blood money is being sent to Russia every day with the