Head of national security council says ‘more and more civilian targets’ being hit, after deadly Vinnytsia attack

• Russia-Ukraine war: latest updates

A top Ukrainian official has accused Russia of deliberately escalating its deadly attacks on civilian targets, after recent missile strikes including this week’s targeting of the crowded city centre of Vinnytsia, which killed 23 people, including three children.

Oleksiy Danilov, the secretary of Ukraine’s national security council, told the Guardian that monitoring of Russian strikes suggested an increased emphasis in recent weeks on terrorising Ukraine’s civilian population.

Moscow claims missile attack on civilian area was directed at building where Ukraine air force officials were meeting suppliers

• Russia-Ukraine war – latest updates

Russia has confirmed it carried out a missile strike on the Ukrainian city of Vinnytsia, the latest in a string of deadly attacks on civilian areas, as worries in Ukraine grow that Russia is preparing a new assault in the east.

The Russian defence ministry claimed in a military briefing on Friday that Thursday’s cruise missile attack was directed at a building where top officials from Ukraine’s air forces were meeting foreign arms suppliers.

Ukraine says up to 70% of Russian missile attacks are deliberately inflicted on “peaceful” Ukrainian cities

Russian and pro-Russian Luhansk People’s Republic separatist forces claim to have entered the outskirts of Siversk in Ukraine’s Donbas, the UK Ministry of Defence has said.

Acknowledging that reports have not corroborated, the ministry said Russian forces have been slowly advancing westwards and probing assaults towards Siversk from Lysychansk to open a pathway onward to Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

Bakhmut is likely to be the next objective, once Siversk is secured,” the report read.

The simple truth is that, as we speak, children, women and men, the young and the old, are living in terror.”