World

Ukraine says Russia creating strike force aimed at Zelenskiy’s hometown

2022.08.03 18:05

Ukraine says Russia creating strike force aimed at Zelenskiy's hometown
FILE PHOTO: Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy attends a joint news conference with Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda, as Russia’s attack on Ukraine continues, in Kyiv, Ukraine July 28, 2022. Ukrainian Presidential Press Service/Handout via REUTER

KYIV (Reuters) – Ukraine said on Wednesday that Russia had started creating a military strike force aimed at President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s hometown of Kryvyi Rih and warned that Moscow could be preparing new offensive operations in southern Ukraine.

Russia holds swathes of Ukraine’s south that it captured in the early phases of its Feb. 24 invasion, but Kyiv has said it will mount a counter-offensive. It said on Tuesday it had already recaptured 53 villages in occupied Kherson region.

In its regular update on the war in the south, Ukraine’s southern military command described the situation as tense and said Russia attacked along the frontline on Aug. 2.

The steel-producing city of Kryvyi Rih where Zelenskiy grew up lies around 50 km (30 miles) from the southern frontline.

“(Russia) has begun creating a strike group in the Kryvyi Rih direction. It’s also quite likely that the enemy is preparing a hostile counter-offensive with the subsequent plan of getting to the administrative boundary of Kherson region,” the southern military command said.

Ukraine has been trying to ratchet up pressure on Russia’s positions in the strategically important Black Sea region of Kherson and has used Western-supplied long-range weapons to conduct strikes on Russian supply lines and ammunition dumps.

Ukraine’s military said in a statement that Russian forces were scoping out basements in the region to turn them into bomb shelters to store military hardware.

Late on Tuesday, Zelensky described the fighting on parts of the eastern frontline in the heavily industrialised Donbas as “just hell” in his nightly address to the nation.

Russia has not claimed any major territorial gains in its invasion since it claimed to have captured Ukraine’s eastern Luhansk region around a month ago.

But on Tuesday Ukraine’s military command acknowledged that Russia had had “partial success” in the “Donetsk-Pisky direction” around the city of Donetsk that is held by Russia and Russian-backed separatists.

Source

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Back to top button
bitcoin
Bitcoin (BTC) $ 96,392.83 1.17%
ethereum
Ethereum (ETH) $ 3,330.74 2.24%
tether
Tether (USDT) $ 1.00 0.04%
solana
Solana (SOL) $ 248.92 2.26%
bnb
BNB (BNB) $ 652.06 0.10%
xrp
XRP (XRP) $ 1.38 5.50%
dogecoin
Dogecoin (DOGE) $ 0.4188 0.65%
usd-coin
USDC (USDC) $ 1.00 0.01%
cardano
Cardano (ADA) $ 0.986545 7.01%
staked-ether
Lido Staked Ether (STETH) $ 3,329.60 2.10%
tron
TRON (TRX) $ 0.205174 3.33%
avalanche-2
Avalanche (AVAX) $ 40.25 3.65%
stellar
Stellar (XLM) $ 0.529306 6.43%
the-open-network
Toncoin (TON) $ 6.06 3.37%
shiba-inu
Shiba Inu (SHIB) $ 0.000025 3.14%
wrapped-steth
Wrapped stETH (WSTETH) $ 3,933.05 2.60%
wrapped-bitcoin
Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) $ 96,109.75 1.33%
polkadot
Polkadot (DOT) $ 8.51 0.06%
chainlink
Chainlink (LINK) $ 17.04 2.45%
bitcoin-cash
Bitcoin Cash (BCH) $ 503.32 0.28%
weth
WETH (WETH) $ 3,327.52 2.45%
sui
Sui (SUI) $ 3.36 1.57%
pepe
Pepe (PEPE) $ 0.00002 3.07%
near
NEAR Protocol (NEAR) $ 6.53 6.63%
leo-token
LEO Token (LEO) $ 8.45 2.07%
litecoin
Litecoin (LTC) $ 95.75 2.79%
aptos
Aptos (APT) $ 12.01 5.66%
uniswap
Uniswap (UNI) $ 10.46 3.63%
wrapped-eeth
Wrapped eETH (WEETH) $ 3,505.39 2.24%
hedera-hashgraph
Hedera (HBAR) $ 0.143223 7.59%
usds
USDS (USDS) $ 1.00 0.20%
internet-computer
Internet Computer (ICP) $ 10.95 3.33%
crypto-com-chain
Cronos (CRO) $ 0.187566 5.04%
polygon-ecosystem-token
POL (ex-MATIC) (POL) $ 0.543625 4.93%
ethereum-classic
Ethereum Classic (ETC) $ 27.88 6.30%
render-token
Render (RENDER) $ 7.59 1.41%
ethena-usde
Ethena USDe (USDE) $ 1.00 0.01%
fetch-ai
Artificial Superintelligence Alliance (FET) $ 1.46 4.19%
kaspa
Kaspa (KAS) $ 0.150704 1.57%
bittensor
Bittensor (TAO) $ 505.59 0.98%
bonk
Bonk (BONK) $ 0.000048 1.53%
whitebit
WhiteBIT Coin (WBT) $ 24.24 1.96%
dai
Dai (DAI) $ 1.00 0.00%
vechain
VeChain (VET) $ 0.04268 1.82%
celestia
Celestia (TIA) $ 7.97 12.75%
arbitrum
Arbitrum (ARB) $ 0.827335 3.53%
mantra-dao
MANTRA (OM) $ 3.63 0.29%
filecoin
Filecoin (FIL) $ 5.46 0.28%
cosmos
Cosmos Hub (ATOM) $ 8.33 1.88%
okb
OKB (OKB) $ 53.40 3.67%