Ukrainian cities take heavy shelling as top US officials meet Zelenskiy in Kyiv

Russian forces continued heavy shelling of Ukrainian cities on Sunday as people in both countries observed Orthodox Easter and the US secretaries of state and defence made their first visit to Kyiv since the invasion.

Antony Blinken and Lloyd Austin arrived in Kyiv and were holding talks with the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Oleksiy Arestovych, an adviser to Zelenskiy, said on Sunday in a social media video.

Ukrainian officials plan to tell Blinken and Austin of the immediate need for more weapons, including anti-missile systems, anti-aircraft systems, armoured vehicles and tanks, Zelenskiy aide Igor Zhovkva told NBC News on Sunday.

The request will come as the conflict ratchets up.

The Russian military reported hitting 423 Ukrainian targets overnight, including fortified positions and troop concentrations, while its warplanes destroyed 26 Ukrainian military sites, including an explosives factory and several artillery depots.

Most of the Easter fighting focused on the eastern Donbas region where Ukrainian forces are concentrated and where Moscow-backed separatists controlled some territory before the war.

Earlier in the day, Kyiv had called for a truce in battered Mariupol for Orthodox Easter, celebrated in both Russia and Ukraine.

Ukrainians meanwhile shared tributes to a journalist, Valeria Glodan, and her three-month-old daughter who were among eight people killed in missile attacks on the southern port of Odesa on Saturday.

Zelenskiy spoke angrily about the death of the baby during a press conference on Saturday night in a Kyiv underground metro station.

Zelenskiy announced he would meet the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and the secretary of defence, Lloyd Austin, in Kyiv on Sunday. The White House declined to comment.

Zelenskiy aide Igor Zhovkva told NBC News on Sunday that Ukrainian officials intended to tell Blinken and Austin of the immediate need for more weapons, including anti-missile systems, anti-aircraft systems, armoured vehicles and tanks,

Reuters, Agence France-Presse and Associated Press contributed to this report