Russia’s military has suffered 100,000 casualties in the past five months in fighting against Ukraine, mostly in the Bakhmut region, the White House has estimated. National security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters the figure, based on US intelligence estimates, included more than 20,000 dead.
Kirby did not detail how the US calculated Russia’s losses, but said about half of those who died were fighting under the Wagner mercenary group, rather than with the Russian military. They were being sent into battle without proper training or leadership, he added.
The Kremlin rejected the assessment as having been “plucked from thin air” and said that Washington had no way of obtaining the correct data. Russia last publicly revealed its tally of losses in the campaign in September, when the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, said 5,937 Russian soldiers had been killed in the conflict.
Shoigu said Tuesday his country was inflicting heavy blows to Ukraine across the entire frontline, but that the supply of weapons was crucial to ensuring the success of what Moscow calls its “special military operation”. In a meeting with Russia’s top military officials, Shoigu said Russian forces were engaged in combat operations “along the entire line of contact” and were fighting not only Ukraine but also “unprecedented military assistance from the West”.
Ukraine’s military vowed on Tuesday not to give up the eastern city of Bakhmut as it prepares to launch a counteroffensive against Russian forces. Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of Ukrainian ground forces, underlined the importance Kyiv attaches to holding Bakhmut as preparations continue for a counterattack which it hopes will change the dynamic of the war in Ukraine. “Together with the commanders, we have made a number of necessary decisions aimed at ensuring the effective defence and inflicting maximum losses on the enemy,” Syrskyi said in remarks released after a visit to troops fighting in Bakhmut. “We will continue, despite all the forecasts and advice, to hold Bakhmut, destroying Wagner and other most combat-capable units of the Russian army,” he told soldiers in video footage of his visit.
All parties in the Black Sea grain initiative will meet for talks on Wednesday, according to a senior Ukrainian source. Top UN trade official Rebeca Grynspan is also expected to travel to Moscow this week amid a diplomatic push to ensure the deal is renewed.
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that overnight three apartment buildings and a school were damaged in Kramatorsk after a strike by Russian S-300 missiles which caused one injury.
Oleh Synyehubov, governor of Kharkiv, has reported that a woman has been injured in the shelling of the village of Petropavlivka, which is close to Ukraine’s border with Russia.
Ukrainian forces shelled a village in the Russian Bryansk region bordering Ukraine early on Tuesday, the local governor said in a social media post, a day after an explosion derailed a freight train in the region.
Denmark will donate 1.7bn Danish crowns (£200m / $249m) to Ukraine for military purposes, the country’s acting defence minister Troels Lund Poulsen said.
On Monday Russia unleashed a fresh missile attack on Ukraine in the east, killing two people, setting off huge blazes and damaging dozens of homes and other buildings in the city of Pavlohrad. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy announced the two deaths in his video address on Monday night. “Forty other people - women, children, men – were treated for wounds and injuries,” he said. Zelenskiy also said a 14-year-boy was killed near his school when it was hit by a bomb in the Chernihiv region, close to the Russian border.
Pavlohrad city council has allocated 9m hryvnias (£200k / £249k) to help victims of rocket attacks on the night of 1 May.
Russian state news agencies reported that Poland’s chargé d’affaires has been summoned to protest what Moscow has called the “seizure” of its embassy school in Warsaw. Russia has pledged a “harsh” response after Polish police shut down the school on Saturday, saying that the premises belonged to the Polish state.
Ukrainian counterattacks have ousted Russian forces from some positions in the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut, but the situation remains “quite difficult”, a top Ukrainian general said Monday. However, Col Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi, the commander of ground forces, added: “At the same time, in certain parts of the city, the enemy was counterattacked by our units and left some positions.” Syrskyi made the remarks while visiting frontline troops on Sunday, the military said.
The head of the Wagner private militia renewed his appeal to Russia’s defence ministry to increase ammunition shipments to his fighters trying to seize Bakhmut. Yevgeny Prigozhin has frequently clashed with Moscow’s defence establishment over the conduct of Russia’s campaign in Ukraine and what he says is insufficient support being provided to his Wagner soldiers. In a video posted on his Telegram channel, Prigozhin said he needs at least 300 tonnes of artillery shells a day for the assault, Reuters reported.
In Washington, Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy emphatically stressed his support for military aid to Ukraine on Monday, criticising Russia’s “killing of the children” and distancing himself from some in his party who oppose additional major US aid to repel the Russian invasion.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy spoke Monday to New Zealand’s prime minister, Chris Hipkins. Ukraine’s president said the pair discussed “further cooperation on defence and humanitarian issues” and “the need for further consolidation of the countries of the Pacific region in supporting Ukraine.”
