11.44am - updates on strikes, death toll, reaction

Missiles rained down on Ukraine's capital Kyiv and other cities on Monday morning, a day after Moscow blamed Ukraine for a deadly blast on the bridge linking Crimea to Russia.

The Ukraine presidency reported that Russia had fired 75 missiles.

In Kyiv, at least five people were killed and another dozen injured in the first strike against the capital city in months, the national police service said.

"The enemy launched massive strikes on Kyiv. Most of the strikes hit the centre of the capital," the national police service said in a statement on Facebook.

The governor of Ukraine's western region of Lviv said bombardments had targeted critical infrastructure, including energy facilities.

'We are dealing with terrorists'

President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia had targeted Ukraine's energy infrastructure and the people.  

"This morning is difficult. We are dealing with terrorists. Dozens of missiles and Iranian Shaheds (drones). They have two targets. Energy facilities throughout the country... They want panic and chaos, they want to destroy our energy system," Zelensky said in a video address on social media, adding that "the second target is people".

Appealing for Ukrainians to stay in shelters, Zelensky accused Russia of wanting to "wipe us from the face of the Earth".

The explosions in Kyiv were reported at around 8.15 am local time and an AFP journalist in the city saw numerous ambulances appearing to head towards the scene of the blasts.

"Several explosions in the Shevchenkivskyi district, in the centre of the capital," Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said on social media. 

Videos from the scene showed black smoke rising above several areas in the city.

EU military support

European Parliament President Roberta Metsola described the wave of attacks as "sickening". 

"It shows the world, again, the regime we are faced with: one that targets indiscriminately. One that rains terror and death down on children," she wrote on Twitter. 

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said he was "deeply shocked" by the attacks and promised that additional military support from the EU "is on its way".

The EU is looking to agree on a new tranche of funds for military spending for Ukraine.

Russia's last strike on Kyiv took place on June 26. The strikes also included a rare attack on the western Lviv region.

Zelensky said that attacks also took place in Dnipro, Vinnytsia and Ivano-Frankivsk in central Ukraine, Zaporizhzhia in the south and Kharkiv and Sumy regions in the east, among others.

Retaliatory attacks

The explosions came a day after Moscow blamed Ukraine for the explosion on a bridge linking Crimea to Russia, leaving three people dead.

"The authors, perpetrators and sponsors are the Ukrainian secret services," Russian President Vladimir Putin said of Saturday's Crimea bridge bombing, which he described as a "terrorist act".

Putin was speaking during a meeting with the head of the investigation committee he has set up to look into the bombing, Russian news agencies reported.

The Russian leader is gearing up for a meeting with his Security Council later Monday, the Kremlin told local news agencies.

"Tomorrow the president has a planned meeting with the permanent members of the Security Council," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

The blast that hit the bridge sparked celebrations from Ukrainians and others on social media.

But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in his nightly address on Saturday, did not directly mention the incident, and officials in Kyiv have made no direct claim of responsibility.

On Saturday, Russia said some road and rail traffic had resumed over the strategic link, a symbol of the Kremlin's 2014 annexation of Crimea.

The 19-kilometre (12-mile) bridge is a vital supply link between Russia and the annexed Crimean peninsula.

Some military analysts argue that the blast could have a major impact if Moscow sees the need to shift already hard-pressed troops to Crimea from other regions -- or if it prompts a rush by residents to leave.

Mick Ryan, a retired Australian senior officer now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said that even if Kyiv was not behind the blast, it constituted "a massive influence operation win for Ukraine.

"It is a demonstration to Russians, and the rest of the world, that Russia's military cannot protect any of the provinces it recently annexed," he said on Twitter.

'Merciless strikes'

Zelensky meanwhile denounced a Russian missile strike on Sunday that killed at least 13 people, one of them a child, in Zaporizhzhia, the latest deadly bombardment of the southern Ukrainian city.

The attack also wounded 89 people, including 11 children, according to a statement from the president's office.

Zelensky described the "merciless strikes on peaceful people" and residential buildings as "absolute evil" perpetrated by "savages and terrorists".

Regional official Oleksandr Starukh posted pictures of heavily damaged apartment blocks on Telegram and said a rescue operation had been launched to find victims under the rubble.

Russian officials meanwhile denounced on Sunday what they said was a surge in Ukrainian fire into its territory that had hit homes, administrative buildings and a monastery.

Russia's FBS, which is responsible for border security, said on Sunday: "Since the start of October, the number of attacks from Ukrainian armed formations on Russia's border territory has considerably increased."

More than a hundred artillery attacks, concentrated on the western border regions of Belgorod, Bryansk and Kursk, had hit housing and administrative buildings, said the statement.

The attacks had killed one person and wounded five others.