Around 20 powerful explosions were heard in Kherson, Sputnik reported on Sunday, adding that traces of air defense missiles were visible in the sky.

Earlier in the day, it was reported that Ukrainian troops shelled a hotel in the center of Kherson with US-supplied HIMARS systems, and two people were killed as a result.

A hotel in Kherson was hit by a Ukrainian missile strike, former member of the Ukrainian parliament Alexei Zhuravko has been killed, another death is also being reported, RT war correspondent Murad Gazdiev & his team were also at the hotel but survived pic.twitter.com/480oHaeBTf

— Russians With Attitude (@RWApodcast) September 25, 2022

The press service of the Kherson regional administration considered that a missile strike on a hotel where journalists lived in the center of Kherson was a terrorist attack, for which the military and political leadership of Ukraine is responsible.

However, local government head Sergey Eliseev stressed that the referendum on joining Russia in the Kherson Region will continue as planned and will be completed in due course despite a deadly missile attack on a hotel in Kherson city center.

Referenda on joining Russia in the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics, as well as in Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, began on Friday and will end on Tuesday. Russian President Vladimir Putin underlined this week that Russia would accept any decision people made during the referendums.

Putin announced Russia's formal recognition of the independence of the DPR and LPR in late February. This led to Ukraine escalating against the republics and using various tactics to try and undermine their leadership and hurt their civilians. That same month, Ukraine shelled a hospital in Donetsk and caused the death of eight civilians in another strike on the region.

The subject of having the referenda promptly was addressed earlier this week by the DPR and LPR public chambers, making official appeals to the rulers of their respective republics on Monday. A day later, the referendum dates were determined, and local legislatures overwhelmingly enacted referendum laws, while elections officials authorized the procedure.

Explosions hit Zaparozhye

Two explosions hit the Russian-held town of Berdiansk, Zaparozhye, as the region's people headed to the polls to vote on whether their region should become part of Russia.

The first blast erupted near the local township at noon, the regional interior ministry said in a statement. The second bomb went off in a trashcan in a park two hours later.

The local authorities said no one was hurt in the explosions and no damage was caused to the administrative building, revealing that investigators were working on the sites.

The Berdiansk administration blamed Kiev's forces for the blasts, calling Ukraine a state sponsor of terror and accusing it of waging the attacks to disrupt the referendum.

At least one person was killed and three others were wounded after the Ukrainian forces shelled the city center of Donetsk, DPR head Denis Pushilin said Saturday.

Likewise, Pushilin accused the Ukrainian forces of initiating several waves of attacks on Donetsk with the aim of disrupting the referendum.