March 10 (UPI) -- At least six people were killed and 22 injured in eastern Ukraine as Russia kept up a wave of bombardment of centers of civilian population with drones, missiles and artillery for a fourth straight day after the United States froze military assistance and intelligence sharing with Kyiv.
Two civilians were killed overnight in Donetsk province amid intense fighting in the frontline city of Pokrovsk with a third person killed in Zoria, 16 miles to the south, Donetsk Gov. Vadym Filashkin wrote in an update on social media Monday.
Filashkin said another six people were injured.
To the north in Kharkiv province, a woman and two men were killed with a third woman injured in a blast from ordnance dropped from a Russian drone on Sunday afternoon.
Kharkiv Gov. Oleh Syniehubov said in a social media post that the attack occurred in the village of Ivashky on the border with Russia's Belgorod province.
A 16-year-old boy and two men, aged 65 and 67, were injured in drone strikes on Zaporizhzhia province, according to Gov. Ivan Federov.
Separately, a woman aged 79 was injured in an artillery strike in which Federov said a house was badly damaged "by a blast wave and debris, and outbuildings and nearby apartments were damaged."
Two women aged 18 and 56 were injured in Dnipro province while authorities in Kherson province reported nine people had been hurt in attacks on more than two dozen communities overnight, including the city of Kherson.
The Ukrainian Air Force said Russian forces launched 176 drones, including Shahed-type attack UAVs, at targets across the east and south of the country overnight but that its air defense systems managed to down 130 of them.
The latest attacks came after at least 25 people were killed and more than 40 were injured in massive airstrikes on eastern and southern Ukraine overnight Friday.
The majority of the fatalities and injuries were in Donetsk province with 11 people killed and 30 injured after two missiles targeting the city of Dobropillya, slammed into eight residential apartment buildings and a shopping center.
The town is 16 miles north of Pokrovsk where Ukrainian forces are battling for control of the city to prevent Russian forces advancing westward into Ukraine's industrial heartlands of Dnipro and Zaporizhzhia.
At least nine others were killed and 13 injured in drone strikes elsewhere in the province and three people were killed and seven injured by attack drones in neighboring Kharkiv province.
Energy infrastructure targets were also hit in Odessa province in the southwest of the country.
Russia has stepped up its airborne assault on Ukraine's civilians and civilian infrastructure in the days since U.S. President Donald Trump announced a pause on the extensive military assistance and support functions the United States provides to Ukraine for a review.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a post on X that over the past week, Russia had targeted Ukraine with around 1,200 guided aerial bombs, 870 attack drones and more than 80 missiles of various types.
U.S. media reported administration sources at the time freeze was announced as saying that Trump needed to be certain Ukraine was on the same page when it came to their commitment to peace and that the aid being provided was "contributing to a solution" rather than hindering or delaying.
Zelensky was due in Saudi Arabia on Monday for talks with the country's de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, ahead of the start of negotiations Tuesday in Jeddah between U.S. and Ukrainian delegations on a framework for a peace agreement and cease-fire between Russia and Ukraine.