July 17 (Reuters) - Russia attacked two Ukrainian Black Sea port cities on Friday, killing three people, Ukrainian officials said, as Moscow intensifies pressure on Ukraine's key trade routes.
A Russian drone attack on port infrastructure at the southern city of Mykolaiv damaged three civilian foreign-flagged vessels, regional prosecutors said.
One of the strikes, early on Friday, killed two Ukrainians on board a foreign vessel, they added.
Another man was killed in a Russian attack on Odesa, Ukraine's biggest seaport, local officials said.
Odesa Regional Governor Oleh Kiper said a later Russian strike hit a Marshall Islands-flagged vessel in one of the Odesa region ports, damaging the vessel, triggering a fire and injuring four of its 17 crew members.
The entire crew was evacuated, Kiper said on Telegram.
ATTACKS HAVE DISRUPTED GRAIN SHIPMENTS
Russia's defence ministry said its forces had struck Ukrainian port facilities overnight in Odesa and Chornomorsk.
Russia has repeatedly attacked Ukraine's maritime export arteries during the war, but the strikes have intensified in past weeks and focused on deepwater ports that handle much of the country's grain and other cargo — vital to its wartime economy.
Ukraine's seaports authority said on Thursday that Russia hit Ukrainian ports and civilian vessels several times in July, killing 11 people, including port workers and foreign crew members.
The strikes have led to a partial halt in grain shipments and an almost complete suspension of grain purchases at port terminals, traders and analysts say.
A Russian missile attack on a residential building in Odesa late on Thursday killed two and injured several people, local authorities said.
"Nothing like this has ever happened before. There are so many air alerts — so many. It's practically one air alert after another," Odesa resident Viktoriia told Reuters.
Ukraine has pressed on with its own campaign to disrupt logistics for Moscow's military and isolate Russia-annexed Crimea. It struck a further 12 Russian vessels in the Black Sea on Friday, Robert Brovdi, the commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces, said.
That brought the total number of vessels struck this month in the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea to 159, he said.
Russian forces have struck 24 vessels used by the Ukrainian military over the past week, the Russian defence ministry said.
(Reporting by Anna Pruchnicka, Editing by William Maclean, Andrew Heavens, Ron Popeski and Cynthia Osterman)
