Two people including a three-year-old child have been killed and around 28 others injured in a Russian strike on Kharkiv, Ukrainian officials have said.

A multi-storey residential apartment block was almost completely destroyed in the dual missile attack on Friday afternoon, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called heinous.

Russia's Defence Ministry denied reports of an attack, suggesting the blast had been caused by Ukrainian ammunition detonating.

The strike comes ahead of crunch talks on a US-brokered peace plan in Kyiv on Saturday.

Zelensky says around 15 countries are expected to attend the talks, along with representatives from the EU and Nato, with a US delegation joining the meeting via video link.

Officials in Kharkiv reported that the bodies of a woman and a three-year-old child were found in the rubble, with preliminary information suggesting they may have been a mother and son.

Unfortunately, this is how the Russians treat life and people – they continue killing, despite all efforts by the world, and especially by the United States, in the diplomatic process, Zelensky wrote on X.

Of the 28 injured, which included a six-month-old baby, 16 have been taken to hospital.

A search and rescue operation is ongoing, with more than 80 volunteers working at the scene, according to regional governor Oleh Syniehubov.

The Russian Defence Ministry stated that its armed forces neither planned nor launched attacks using missile weapons or aircraft weapons within the city of Kharkiv and indicated that footage from before the attack showed heavy smoke of unknown origin, suggesting ammunition detonated by Ukrainian forces.

They also alleged that reports were attempts to distract from a New Year's Eve strike on a hotel in a Russian-held part of the southern Kherson region of Ukraine.

Russia's Investigative Committee has opened an investigation into the attack, while the Russian foreign ministry accused Zelensky of seeking to intimidate the populations of the reunited Russian regions, who have forever linked their fates with Russia through referendums.