Russia claims two more villages in eastern Ukraine

KYIV: Russia said Thursday that it took two more east Ukrainian villages – in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions – as its forces continue their advance deeper into the country.

The defence ministry said Russian forces captured the village of Mykolaivka, around 15 kilometres (nine miles) from the city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region, as well as the settlement of Stelmakhivka in the neighbouring Lugansk region.

Russian forces have been making steady and determined advances towards the logistics hub of Pokrovsk – once home to some 60,000 people – over recent months.

One killed, two injured in strikes on Russia’s Belgorod

Outnumbered Ukrainian forces awaiting more Western military aid have struggled to hold back their assaults.

Kyiv earlier this month launched a surprise ground assault into Russia’s border region of Kursk hoping that the offensive would draw Moscow’s army away from Donetsk.

The Russian army however has focused its firepower on the industrial Donetsk region and advanced despite the Ukrainian attacks in Kursk.

Russian shelling on Nikopol in southern Ukraine meanwhile killed one person and wounded five more, regional authorities said.

“A shopping centre, various high-rise buildings, residential buildings, cars and a gas pipeline were damaged,” Sergiy Lysak, the governor of the Dnipropetrovsk region, wrote on social media.

Kyiv also said Thursday that Russia had launched 74 attack drones and five missiles at targets across Ukraine but that air defence systems downed most of the projectiles.

The overnight barrage was the third night of large-scale Russian bombardments this week that left at least 11 people dead.

AFP journalists in the capital heard air raid sirens echoing out over Kyiv and at least one explosion during the attacks.

Authorities in the capital and the surrounding area said several private homes had been damaged but that there were no known casualties in the aerial assault.

In Cherkasy, a city in central Ukraine, officials said the attack sparked a fire spanning nearly 3,000 square metres that dozens of emergency service workers were extinguishing.

The air force said its units had downed two of the missiles and 60 of the Iranian-designed attack drones. More of the drones crashed.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said this week for the first time that Western-supplied F-16s had been used to counter drone and missile attacks.