Russia and Ukraine are suffering high numbers of military casualties as Volodymyr Zelensky’s troops dislodge Kremlin forces from occupied areas, British officials said Sunday.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s losses are probably at their highest level since the peak of the battle for Bakhmut in March, the Ministry of Defence added in their regular assessment.
The most intense fighting is centred on the southeastern Zaporizhzhia province, around Bakhmut and further west in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk area.
While the British intelligence update reported that Ukraine was on the offensive in these areas and had “made small advances”, it said that Russian forces were conducting “relatively effective defensive operations” in the south.
Ukrainian military also reported Russia had carried out 43 airstrikes, four missile strikes and 51 attacks from multiple rocket launchers over the previous 24 hours.
According to their statement, Putin’s soldiers continues to concentrate its efforts on offensive operations in Ukraine’s industrial east, focusing attacks around Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Marinka and Lyman in the country’s Donetsk province, with 26 combat clashes taking place.
Donetsk regional governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said that two civilians were killed, with a further three wounded in the past day.
One civilian was killed and four more wounded in Kherson province, while Zaporizhzhia regional governor Yurii Malashko said one person was wounded in Russian attacks that hit 20 settlements.
Vladimir Rogov, an official with the Moscow-appointed administration in the partially occupied Zaporizhzhia region, said on Sunday that Ukrainian forces had taken control of the village of Piatykhatky on the Zaporizhzhia battlefront.
Serhiy Bratchuk, spokesperson of the regional government in the southwestern Odesa province, added Ukrainian president Zelensky’s men destroyed a “very significant” ammunition depot near the Russian-occupied port city of Henichesk in nearby Kherson province.
“Our armed forces dealt a good blow in the morning,” Bratchuk said in a video message on Sunday morning, posted to his Telegram channel.
Western analysts and military officials have cautioned that Ukraine’s counteroffensive to dislodge the Kremlin’s forces from occupied areas, using Western-supplied advanced weapons in attacks along the 1,000 kilometre (600 mile) front line could last a long time.
A group of African leaders have carried out a self-styled “peace mission” to both Ukraine and Russia in recent days to try to help end their nearly 16-month-old war, but the visit ended on Saturday with no immediate signs of progress.
South Africa’s president Cyril Ramaphosa told Russian dictator Putin the war in Ukraine must end.
