Ukrainian forces have recaptured about 500 sq km of territory in the south of the country over the past two weeks, Natalia Humeniuk, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s southern military command, said on Monday. This includes five settlements in the Kherson region, Humeniuk said.
The Kremlin responded Monday to Ukraine’s weekend advances by doubling down and saying that Russia will achieve the goals of its “special military operation”. In this same call, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov also said that there were no discussions taking place about the possible demilitarisation of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, despite it being one of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s key recommendations from its visit to the plant.
Russian missile strikes on Monday have once again knocked out power and halted the water supply in Kharkiv, said Ihor Terekhov, the mayor of Kharkiv city, on Telegram. The shelling targeting the region’s infrastructure came after rescue workers had restored about 80% of the power and water to the region following more targeted attacks the day before. Both Terekhov and Volodymyr Zelenskiy have decried these attacks on infrastructure as “Russian terrorists”. “No military facilities [were attacked],” the Ukrainian president said in a statement on social media. “The goal is to deprive people of light and heat.”
At least 1,000 people have been killed in the last six months fighting in Izium, a city in north-eastern Ukraine. Izium is one of the more than 20 towns and villages that Ukraine’s general staff said its forces had recaptured in the past days, as part of a counteroffensive that has forced Russian forces to abandon their positions and leave behind huge stocks of ammunition and equipment. Now with the city back in Ukrainian hands, officials are able to assess its losses and warned that the real figure of people killed since Russian forces took the city as a main stronghold is probably much higher.
Russian forces launched 11 missiles against eastern Ukraine overnight, the Ukrainian air force announced in a tweet on Sunday night, causing a total blackout in the Kharkiv and Donetsk regions, and partial blackouts in the Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk and Sumy regions. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukraine’s president, said Kharkiv’s CHPP-5 electricity station – one of the largest in Ukraine – had been hit. Kyrylo Tymoshenko, the deputy head of the president’s office, said later that power had been restored in some regions.
The US ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, denounced Russia’s strikes on the power and water facilities. “Russia’s apparent response to Ukraine liberating cities and villages in the east: sending missiles to attempt to destroy critical civilian infrastructure,” Brink tweeted.
The general commanding Russia’s western army group has been sacked after the retreat in the Kharkiv region, according to Ukrainian military intelligence. It reported on its Telegram channel that Gen Roman Berdnikov has been replaced after only 17 days in his post, the GUR said.
The success of Ukrainian forces in pushing Russian troops out of the Kharkiv region “have significant implications for Russia’s overall operational design”, according to the UK Ministry of Defence, and for the morale of its soldiers on the ground. “The majority of the force in Ukraine is highly likely being forced to prioritise emergency defensive actions. The already limited trust deployed troops have in Russia’s senior military leadership is likely to deteriorate further.”
Kirill Stremousov, one of the leaders of the Russian-imposed authorities in occupied Kherson in southern Ukraine, has questioned the situation to the north, saying that “Kherson is and will be a Russian city. No one is going to surrender the city, let alone retreat. Regarding the situation in the Kharkiv region, many of us are at a loss about the current situation.”
Dmitry Medvedev, the hawkish long-term ally of Russia’s president, and currently deputy chairman of the security council of Russia, has threatened Ukraine again, saying: “Zelenskiy said that he would not engage in dialogue with those who put forward ultimatums. The current ‘ultimatums’ are a child’s warm-up for the demands of the future. And he knows them: the total capitulation of the Kyiv regime on Russia’s terms.”
Western governments are mobilising their arms manufacturers to ramp up production and replenish stockpiles heavily diminished by supplying Ukraine’s six-month-old battle against Russia’s invasion. The US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, is organising a meeting of senior national armaments directors from allied countries to make long-term plans for supplying Ukraine and rebuilding their own arms reserves.
The acting United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Nada al-Nashif, said on Monday morning that Russia was intimidating opponents of the war in Ukraine. “In the Russian Federation, the intimidation, restrictive measures and sanctions against people voicing opposition to the war in Ukraine undermine the exercise of constitutionally guaranteed fundamental freedoms, including the rights to free assembly, expression and association.”
Joe Biden’s new ambassador in Berlin has urged Olaf Scholz’s government to “take more of a leadership role”, as calls grow for Germany to support Ukraine’s advances in the north-east by delivering tanks. After praising Germany’s military and financial support for Kyiv, the US ambassador, Amy Guttmann, told broadcaster ZDF “my expectations for Germany are higher”.
Ukraine on Sunday shut down the last operating reactor at Europe’s biggest nuclear power plant to guard against a catastrophe as fighting rages nearby. Russia and Ukraine accuse each other of shelling around the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia plant, risking a release of radiation. The International Atomic Energy Agency said a backup power line to the plant had been restored, providing the external electricity it needed to carry out the shutdown while defending against the risk of a meltdown.
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, told Putin in a phone call on Sunday the plant’s occupation by Russian troops is the reason why its security is compromised, the French presidency said. Putin blamed Ukrainian forces, according to a Kremlin statement.
Ramzan Kadyrov, the Kremlin-appointed leader of Chechnya, has criticised the Russian army’s leadership after it appeared to be caught off-guard by Ukraine’s fightback against the Russian invasion in the north-east. In a sign that the Kremlin may face serious fallout over the loss of territory that the Russian occupation administrations had repeatedly stated they planned to keep “forever”, Kadyrov also suggested that Vladimir Putin might not be aware of the real state of affairs.
