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President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s recent adamance about Ukrainian forces’ early success in the country’s highly anticipated counteroffensive is clashing with mounting evidence that Russia’s invading forces are taking new ground. “We have no lost positions,” Zelenskyy stressed in his nightly video address on Sunday. “In some areas, our warriors are moving forward. In some areas, they are defending their positions and resisting the occupiers' assaults and intensified attacks.” But, he concluded, “We have no lost positions. Only liberated ones. They have only losses.” Zelenskyy’s positive assessment aligns with the need of any embattled government to maintain national morale and to affirm...

Ukraine reported a fresh wave of attacks on key infrastructure facilities on Saturday, a day after Russia claimed to have captured the ravaged eastern town of Soledar following a long battle. Victory in Soledar would be a rare achievement for Moscow after an embarrassing series of military setbacks — although Kyiv insisted fighting was still ongoing in the city on Saturday. Ukrainian infrastructure once again came under fire on Saturday as winter deepened, officials said. "Today, the enemy fired at energy facilities again," energy company Ukrenergo said, adding that it was working on "eliminating the consequences" of the strikes. In...

Russia's defence ministry says its forces are taking part in the battle for Soledar, a town north of Bakhmut in east Ukraine which has been the focus of recent fighting. It comes after the head of Russia's notoriously brutal Wagner mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, claimed his fighters were in full control there and boasted that only his troops took part. Mr Prigozhin will most likely use any victory to bolster the reputation of Wagner as an effective fighting force in the eyes of President Putin. But the Russian defence ministry appeared to contradict the controversial oligarch's claims. Spokesman Igor Konashenkov...

Welcome to my newest update on Putin’s War in Ukraine. We are now 36 weeks — 254 days — since Russia launched an unprovoked attack on Ukraine. My last update can be found at Putin’s War, Week 35. The Lull Before the Next Storm. There has been some action, but the crappy weather has slowed things down. Also, both sides are somewhat tired after a punishing summer’s campaigning. I look at this period as the break when the fighters have returned to their corners. Two significant items have been covered outside this update. First, the Pentagon is beefing up the...

Update from Ukraine | Strange moves from Ruzzia in Kherson | New tanks for Ukraine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJP6o7zoeys Follow on Instagram up to date uploads. https://www.instagram.com/denys_pilot/ Military maps here: https://militaryland.net/ Invasion Day 254 – Summary https://militaryland.net/news/invasion-day-254-summary/

Russian soldiers are forcing Ukrainian civilians from their apartments in the occupied capital of the Kherson region and moving in themselves, a resident said Friday as the southern city became a growing focus of war in Ukraine. His account of soldiers spreading throughout the city of Kherson suggested that Russia could be preparing for intense urban warfare in anticipation of Ukrainian advances. (snip) A Kherson resident told The Associated Press that Russian soldiers were installing themselves in vacated apartments. Russian military personnel were going door to door, checking property deeds and forcing tenants to leave immediately if they can't prove...

Vladimir Putin faced severe embarrassment when Ukrainian soldiers liberated the key eastern city of Lyman, raising the blue and yellow national flag above its entrance sign, hours after Russia’s president announced that the area was Moscow’s “for ever”. Ukraine’s armed forces said they had entirely surrounded the city, trapping thousands of Russian soldiers inside. The governor of Luhansk province, Serhiy Haidai, said the besieged troops had begged on Friday to be allowed to leave Lyman. Their commanders refused, he claimed. With no way out, the Russians could either surrender, try to escape or die together, Haidai said. An attempt by...

Russia has begun recruiting sick and injured soldiers from hospital to replace its losses, according to Ukraine.The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine's Facebook page provided an update on the ongoing conflict between the country and Russia on Monday. In the update, Ukraine highlighted recent attacks by Russian forces and said they had been firing on both military and civilian infrastructure. It also said, Russia was continuing with "forced mobilization" for areas it occupied in Ukraine.

Russia is preparing to hold "sham" referendums in occupied Ukrainian territories within a matter of days or weeks, the US warned on Wednesday. Moscow has instructed officials to begin preparations in areas that have fallen under its control during its war on Ukraine, including Kharkiv, Kherson, Zaporizhia, parts of Donetsk and Luhansk, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters. The first referenda could be announced as soon as this week's end, he added, noting the US and international community will not view any such elections as legitimate. "We expect Russia to try to manipulate the results of these referenda...

An ailing Vladimir Putin is flailing over his war strategy, torn between using nuclear weapons and accepting defeat and handing back Ukrainian regions invaded by his forces, a Telegram channel claims. Amid fresh concerns over his health, his security officials have bluntly told the warmonger president that he has run out of 'good' options. This comes as the death toll in the Russian armed forces plus separatist fighters and pro-Putin private armies has reached almost 65,000, said General SVR Telegram channel, an opposition source offering 'insider' information which the Kremlin is 'seeking to shut down'. There is 'despondency' among Putin’s...

Plumes of black smoke were seen on Tuesday at a Russian military airbase near the settlement of Gvardeyskoye in the centre of Russian-controlled Crimea, Russia’s Kommersant newspaper reported. Earlier on Tuesday, Russia’s Defence Ministry separately blamed a series of explosions around Dzhankoi in northern Crimea on “sabotage”, state-owned news agency RIA reported. Ukraine has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement in a recent series of blasts in Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014.

Explosions shook an ammunition depot in Russian-annexed Crimea on Tuesday, the latest such incident in a region used by Moscow as a staging post for its war in Ukraine.

Russia has abandoned 20,000 troops near Kherson in the face of a Ukrainian counter-attack, the regional governor has claimed. Vitaly Kim said Russia is relocating command posts on the west bank of the Dnipro River to the east, leaving 'stupid orcs' - his term for Kremlin soldiers - behind. Ukraine has already blown up all three bridges under Russian control connecting the two banks, meaning its soldiers on the west side have no easy way of resupplying, reinforcing, or retreating as Kyiv's men continue their advance. Kim, the governor of Mykolaiv which sits on the west bank, said Monday that...

Russian spies are refusing to move to occupied parts of Ukraine, FSB insider says Even salaries six or eight times the usual amount cannot entice reluctant agents Some are hiding behind medical certificates signed by compliant doctors Retirees are now being called on, but just three of 200 'said they would consider' Vladimir Putin's secret services agents are refusing to work in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, an FSB 'insider' has claimed. Even salaries six to eight times higher than usual are failing to persuade counter-intelligence officers to move to conquered areas, the alleged source said. Putin urgently needs both regular...

Russia is facing “economic oblivion” in the long term because of international sanctions and the flight of businesses, several economists have said. ... However, many economists see long-lasting costs to the Russian economy from the exit of foreign firms – which will hit production capacity and capital and result in a “brain drain” – along with the loss of its long-term oil and gas markets and diminished access to critical imports of technology and inputs.

POKROVSK, Ukraine — Camouflaged in a heap of branches cut from nearby trees, the weapon that Ukraine hopes will make a critical difference in its war with Russia is all but invisible from more than a few feet away. Soon, a single round shoots out with a boom and a howling, metallic shriek as it sails toward Russian positions. It is the American-made M777 howitzer. It shoots farther, moves faster and is hidden more easily, and it’s what the Ukrainian military has been waiting for. Three months into the war in Ukraine, the first M777s — the most lethal weapons...

Official Ukrainian statements, independent news reports, local social media, and RF state-controlled news platforms on Friday said UAF advance elements had closed on Ukraine’s border with Russia at multiple locations, Fighting according to those reports was in progress for the Ukraine-side border villages of Lipsy, Vesele, Kozacha Lopan’, Pitomik and Russki Tishy, all to Kharkiv’s north. ….snip Video images made public by the RF state-controlled news platform Readovka on May 13 showed scattered mortar or artillery strikes purportedly hitting fields and homes near the Solokhi, some 10 km inside Russia. There was no outside confirmation of the bombardment, but...

As Vladimir Putin’s health reportedly declines, body doubles have been put on alert to stand in for the Russian not-so-strongman when he undergoes surgery, according to a report. Putin will be out of commission for up to 10 days and the body doubles will be used to make it seem like he’s still in control of the country, the anti-Putin Telegram channel “General SVR” reported. The mysterious Telegram account also claimed that pre-recorded footage will be released of Putin attending meetings and signing laws to make it seem like he is still working. The channel — which is purportedly run...

Russia's top commander General Valery Gerasimov has been suspended, a top adviser to the Ukrainian president has claimed, while a clutch of other officers have been sacked or arrested amid a rumoured purge of top brass. Oleksiy Arestovych, a veteran of military intelligence and one of President Zelensky's inner circle, claimed late Wednesday that Gerasimov - the chief of staff of the Russian army - has been suspended as Putin looks for senior commanders to blame over his blundering invasion of Ukraine. Arestovych, speaking to dissident Russian lawyer and politician Mark Feygin on YouTube last night, said: 'According to preliminary...