Ukraine has carried out a series of deadly strikes on the Russian border city of Belgorod, the day after an 18-hour aerial barrage across Ukraine killed at least 39 civilians. Russian officials said that the shelling in the centre of Belgorod on Saturday killed 14 people and injured 108 more. Footage of the city published on Russian social media showed burning cars and black smoke rising from damaged buildings. One strike hit close to a central ice rink. Belgorod is just over half an hour’s drive from the border with Ukraine, making it a vital stop for Russian supply lines. The city has suffered extensive shelling and drone attacks for months that authorities have blamed on Ukraine. On Saturday evening, a Russian attack on central Kharkiv left more than 20 people injured. According to Kharkiv’s mayor, Igor Terekhov, two people at the Kharkiv Palace hotel were wounded in a missile hit, including a British citizen. Another missile that hit a residential building backyard left 14 injured. More strikes were reported in the south-eastern part of the city. Earlier in the day, Russian officials reported shooting down 32 Ukrainian drones over the Moscow, Bryansk, Oryol and Kursk regions. They also reported that cross-border shelling had killed two other people in Russia. A man died and four other people were injured when a missile struck a private home in the Belgorod region late on Friday evening and a nine-year-old was killed in a separate incident in the Bryansk region. The Kremlin said that Vladimir Putin had been briefed about the strike on Belgorod. Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that the Russian president had instructed the minister of health to travel to Belgorod. Russia’s defence ministry claimed in a statement that Kyiv used Ukrainian Olkha and Czech-made Vampire rockets fitted with cluster-munition warheads during its attack on Belgorod. “This crime will not go unpunished,” the defence ministry said. “The Kyiv regime, which committed this crime, is trying to distract attention from defeats at the front, and is also wanting to provoke us,” the statement added. Ukraine has not acknowledged launching any strikes on Saturday and rarely comments on attacks on Russian territory. If the number is confirmed, the strike would be one of the deadliest strikes on the country during the war so far. Ukrainian media – citing law enforcement agencies – claimed that the attacks only hit military targets and were retaliation for Friday’s mass bombardment of Ukrainian cities. The Friday barrage was described by Ukrainian officials as Russia’s biggest air attack on the country so far. The strikes on Ukraine on Friday confirmed fears long held in Kyiv and the west that Moscow was building up a large missile stockpile that it was planning to use this winter to target the country’s energy system. On Friday evening, an emergency meeting of the UN security council condemned Russia’s latest mass-bombing campaign in Ukraine. “Once again, Ukrainians are forced to spend the holidays seeking shelter, clearing the rubble and burying the dead, amidst freezing temperatures,” UN assistant secretary-general Khaled Khiari said after briefing the council on the attacks. Russia’s aerial attacks have also sparked concern for Ukraine’s direct neighbours. Poland’s defence forces said on Friday that an unknown object had entered the country’s airspace before vanishing off radars, and that all indications pointed to it being a Russian missile. Speaking to Russian state media outlet RIA Novosti on Saturday, Russia’s charge d’affaires in Poland, Andrei Ordash, said that Moscow would not comment on the event until Warsaw had given the Kremlin evidence of an airspace violation. “Until concrete evidence is presented, we will not give any explanations, because these accusations are unsubstantiated,” he said.