The Ukraine Military annouces its long awaited South Offensive around Kherson….
The International Atomic Energy Agency (UN) inspectors are on thei way to the Ukraine Nuclear power plant in Zaporizhzhia …
The Ukrainian military announced on Monday that it had launched offensive operations in multiple areas along the front line in the Kherson region in southern Ukraine, perhaps signaling the start of a broad and long anticipated counteroffensiveaimed at retaking territory seized by Russia.
Fighting along a swath of the front line escalated sharply on Monday, according to Ukrainian military and civilian officials, and the Ukrainian government said that its military had “breached the occupiers’ first line of defense near Kherson.”
The Ukrainian military also claimed on Monday to have struck a large Russian military base behind Russian lines in the Kherson region, destroying it. It was not immediately possible to verify the claims.
Across the Kherson region — whose capital was the first major city to fall to Russian forces after President Vladimir V. Putin invaded Ukraine in February — electrical networks blinked out amid the fighting on Monday, and Russian media reported evacuations from towns in the area.
A United States defense official lent support to the idea that Ukraine was escalating its offensive in the south, saying: “The announced offensive shows the Ukrainians’ appetite for progress on the battlefield.” The official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military matters, added that the Pentagon remained cautious about whether Ukraine’s current military capabilities were sufficient to make significant gains.
It remained unclear if this was the start of the southern counteroffensive that Ukraine has telegraphed for months, or a continuation of strikes in the south that Ukraine has been carrying out for the last several weeks.
Ukrainian officials were circumspect in their statements on Monday….
Here’s what you need to know:
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Ukraine announces offensive operations across the south.
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Battlefield updates
- Ukrainian attacks on Russian forces in the south, around Mykolaiv and Kherson, began Monday on Zelensky’s “direct orders,” said Humeniuk, the spokeswoman for the Ukrainian military’s southern command.
- Zelensky declined to reveal specifics of Ukraine’s battle strategy in his evening address, but he issued a broad warning to Russian troops. “Anyone want to know what our plans are?” he said. “You won’t hear specifics from any truly responsible person. Because this is war. And this is what it is during the war. But the occupiers should know: we will oust them to the border. To our border, the line of which has not changed. The invaders know it well.”
- Kharkiv was targeted with cluster munitions early Monday, according to Ukrainian officials. A 77-year-old man was injured, and residential buildings were damaged in the Kyivskyi district of Kharkiv, in northeastern Ukraine, regional governor Oleh Synyehubov said. Russian forces also struck Kharkiv late Sunday, partially damaging government buildings in the center of Ukraine’s second-largest city, Synyehubov said.
- Russia hit two districts northeast of Zaporizhzhiaearly Monday, causing a fire and damaging at least one residential building, Reznichenko, the Dnipropetrovsk regional governor, said. He said the number of dead and injured was still being clarified.
- “Russian forces conducted limited ground attacks” in the eastern region of Donetsk on Sunday, according to the Institute for the Study of War, a U.S.-based think tank. Eight people died, and seven were injured in the strikes on settlements, including Slovyansk and Bakhmut, the Ukrainian government’s Center for Strategic Communication and Information Security said. Many residential buildings were damaged, it said.
- Ahead of a return to school across Ukraine in September, authorities are scrambling to build bomb shelters, Reuters reported….