Ukrainian and Russian strikes kill several in both countries

Ukrainian rescuers work to extinguish a fire at a damaged residential building in Zaporizhzhia. [Darya Nazarova,AFP]

Ukrainian drone strikes killed four people, mostly outside Moscow, on Monday while Russian strikes on Ukraine killed at least six -- including on a cargo ship -- officials from both countries said.

The strikes came as Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky is due to meet with allies in Paris for talks on pushing Moscow to end the almost four-and-a-half-year war.

Kyiv has upped its retaliatory strikes on Russia, hitting as far from the front as Siberia and the Urals and causing nationwide fuel shortages, with Zelensky vowing to keep up the pressure on Moscow.

Moscow Region Governor Andrey Vorobyov said 81 drones had been downed over the region surrounding the capital.

"In the settlement of Pionersky in Istra, three people were killed and three more wounded as a result of a drone falling," he said, adding that two more people were wounded in another part of the region.

He published images of a badly destroyed house and apartment blocks with blown-out windows.

Russian officials also said that a woman was killed in the border town of Berezovka, in the Belgorod region, and that the southern Stavropol region had also been attacked.

The strikes come after several deadly Russian ballistic missile attacks on Ukraine's capital Kyiv this month.

Ukraine said Russia had hit a cargo ship in a deadly attack, killing three.

"Russia struck a civilian commercial vessel flying the flag of Togo while it was unloading mineral fertilizers," Ukraine's minister for communities and territorial development, Oleksii Kuleba, said.

Another Russian drone strike killed two people in the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, near the frontline and regularly under attack, and in the neighbouring Kherson region, local officials said.

Russia's campaign against Ukraine has killed thousands of civilians and turned into Europe's worst conflict since WWII.

Zelensky is due to meet with the leaders of France, the UK and Germany in Paris for a summit of the so-called Coalition of the Willing.

But the Kremlin on Monday dismissed the meeting as a "coalition of the deluded and of warmongers".

US-led diplomatic efforts to end the fighting have stalled in recent months.