A large part of Ukraine without electricity due to Russian attacks on infrastructure, more wounded in Russia, Zelensky accuses China

Ukraine imposed an emergency blackout across much of the country today, a day after Russia launched major attacks on energy infrastructure and said its military was advancing in the eastern Donetsk region.

Power restrictions are in place in all but three regions following Saturday's drone and missile attack on energy targets that injured 19 people.

Ukraine's state-owned electricity grid operator Ukrenergo said the outages affected both industry and households.

Incessant Russian attacks on Ukraine's power grid in recent weeks have forced the government to impose blackouts across the country. Without adequate anti-aircraft defenses to counter Russian attacks and allow for repairs, the situation may worsen as the need for electricity increases.

Among the most significant recent attacks were the April barrage that damaged the largest thermal power plant in Kiev and the massive attack on May 8 that targeted electricity generation and transmission facilities in several regions.

After Saturday's barrage, the Ukrainian Air Force announced today that anti-aircraft defenses shot down all 25 drones launched during the night.

Russia claimed on Sunday that it had taken control of the village of Umanske in the Donetsk region, which is partially under Russian occupation.

Russia's coordinated new offensive is focused on Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv region, but appears to include testing Ukrainian defenses further south in Donetsk, while making inroads into the northern regions of Sumy and Chernihiv.

In Russia, six people were wounded in the shelling of the city of Shebekin in the Belgorod region on the border of Ukraine - regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Sunday, adding that the deputy head of the Korochansky district was killed by "munitions detonation".

In the neighboring Kursk region, three people were wounded today by a bomb from a drone, said acting regional director Alexey Smirnov.

Speaking at the Asian Security Conference in Singapore, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky today accused China of helping Russia disrupt the upcoming Swiss-hosted peace conference on the war in Ukraine.

Also today, White House National Security Adviser John Kirby confirmed that President Joseph Biden has agreed to allow Ukraine to use US-provided weapons for attacks inside Russia to ease Russia's "incredible pressure" on Kharkiv.

This Sunday, four US officials, who requested anonymity, said Biden had given Ukraine the "green light" to use US weapons to strike inside Russia for the limited purpose of defending Kharkiv.

Ukraine asked for permission to use US-provided weapons to attack "imminent threats across the border," Kirby said Sunday on the ABC show.

"We're talking about military positions, deployment of weapons, things like that. Logistic bases that the Russians used to create a kind of buffer zone so they could continue to strike Kharkiv," Kirby said, pointing out that the permit "is limited to the Kharkiv region and it's limited in terms of the types of targets they can hit and how far they can go."