Ukraine continues counteroffensive in Donetsk and south

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that liberating settlements from Russian occupation is now “the trend” as his forces press further into the eastern Donetsk region and seek gains in the south.

As Russia’s forces lose ground to Kyiv’s counteroffensive, the Kremlin said it still hasn’t finalized the borders of two of the four regions of Ukraine that President Vladimir Putin laid claim to last week.

His comment comes after the strategic eastern town of Lyman was “fully cleared,” the president said in a brief video. The town is part of the regions Putin annexed following referendums termed illegal by Ukraine and its allies.

Ukrainian forces resumed a counteroffensive in the southern Kherson region and have secured positions in Zolota Balka and Khreshchenivka, the US-based Institute for the Study of War said. Ukrainian forces continued to win back settlements east and northeast of Lyman and have taken Torske in the Donetsk region. Infrastructure in the city of Zaporizhzhia was damaged by missile strikes Monday morning. Over the past day, Russia launched 11 missile and 10 air strikes and over 65 rocket attacks, attacking some 35 Ukrainian settlements, Ukraine’s General Staff said.

Ukraine Advances in Southern Kherson Region

Following something of a pause in offensive operations in the south, Ukrainian troops have begun a renewed counteroffensive in the Kherson region. According to Russian military bloggers, by Monday morning they had made significant inroads along the northern reaches of the massive Dnipro river’s western bank.

Russia’s Defense Ministry conceded that its forces pulled back after “superior tank units were able to pierce deep into our defenses” near Zolota Balka and Oleksandrivka.

Although Putin last week annexed four Ukrainian provinces, including Kherson and Donetsk, Moscow’s forces don’t fully control of any of the areas and are being pushed out of some towns they’ve held for months, raising concerns over Putin’s threats of escalation, including the potential use of nuclear weapons.

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