Two killed in Russian missile attacks on Kyiv after Ukraine-EU drone deal

KYIV, July 16 (Agencies): Russian strikes on Kyiv killed two people and wounded at least five others, including a child, Ukrainian emergency services said on Thursday, after explosions rocked the capital shortly after midnight.
The attack is the latest in Russia's near-daily bombardment of Ukrainian cities, as Moscow presses its invasion which is now in its fifth year.
AFP journalists in Kyiv heard a series of explosions after a Ukrainian air force alert reported the approach of several ballistic missiles.
There were a number of bright flashes in the sky over Ukraine's capital, followed by half a dozen detonations, they said.
"Two people have been killed in Kyiv as a result of an enemy attack," Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Telegram.
Ukraine's state emergency service said five people were wounded and that the Sviatoshynskyi and Darnytskyi districts were hit.
The attack came a few hours after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen visited to boost defence ties.
Mayor Klitschko wrote on social media earlier that a warehouse was hit while "missile debris fell on non-residential buildings".
At the same time, Kharkiv, the main city in northeast Ukraine, was hit by combat drones, its mayor said.
Kyiv has been regularly targeted by Russian ballistic missiles since last month. The weapons are fast and difficult to intercept.
Meanwhile, protests have been taking place in several Ukrainian cities against President Volodymyr Zelensky's surprise dismissal of popular Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov.
A crowd of people - mostly young - gathered in Kyiv on Thursday morning, holding up signs reading "Hands off Fedorov" and "Stop sabotaging victory!" and chanting "Shame!".
Zelensky's decision has causing significant upset among commentators and the military as well as parts of civil society.
The rumours that the end of Fedorov's tenure was related to tensions between him and Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi were all but confirmed by Fedorov himself and Zelensky.
On Thursday, Fedorov revealed he had suggested to Zelensky that Syrskyi and Chief of the General Staff Andrii Hnatov should be replaced.