Ukraine-Russia war latest: Poland says Putin is planning to launch drone or missile attack on a Nato country

Polish prime minister Donald Tusk says Russia is planning hybrid strikes with drones or missiles targeting Nato countries supporting Ukraine , potentially including Poland .

The warning came as “a massive attack on ​the ⁠western part of Ukraine – very close to the Polish border,” took place, with Poland repeatedly forced to scramble its aircraft.

While Poland’s airspace was not breached, Tusk warned that Russia was planning to strike Nato territory and then pretend the attack was "accidental".

This, he told the parliament, would be in a bid to "paralyse or at least weaken the motivation of Nato countries" to rush to the defence of the member state coming under attack.

Earlier on Thursday, Russian forces carried a barrage of attacks on Ukrainian cities, including a ⁠strike on an industrial park west of Kyiv that killed one person, a local official said.

And in Russia, a Ukrainian drone attack damaged an oil ⁠refinery in the city of Yaroslavl, Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed.

Regional polls have opened in Russia for the first parliamentary election since the country's war on Ukraine that began four years ago.

They come amid plummeting approval ratings for Vladimir Putin , mounting casualties on the frontline and minimal territorial gains in the grinding war.

The country’s electoral system is tightly controlled and Putin’s United Russia party is expected to retain its majority in the State Duma, which comprises 450 members. It currently has 310 seats and needs to win at least 300 in order to retain its supermajority.

Russian forces carried a barrage of attacks on Ukrainian cities on Thursday, including a ⁠strike on an industrial park west of Kyiv that killed one person, a local official said.

Russia's military had previously carried out most of its attacks at night, but in ⁠recent weeks it has ​expanded ⁠them to daylight hours.

Vitali Bunechko, governor of Zhytomyr region, said the industrial park strike occurred near ⁠the town of Korosten.

The Ukrainian capital underwent ​a ⁠series of air alerts through ‌the day and its mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said one strike hit a non-residential building, injuring one person.

In ‌the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, ‌regional governor Ivan Fedorov said Russian forces attacked a market, triggering a large blaze.