Ukrainian troops, bolstered by increased Western military aid, launched a long-awaited counteroffensive on Monday to retake their territory in the south as Russian forces shelled residential areas of the Black Sea port city of Mykolaiv.
Moscow acknowledged that a new offensive had been launched, but said it had failed and the Ukrainians had suffered significant casualties.
But a barrage of Ukrainian rockets left the Russian-occupied town of Nova Kakhovka without water and electricity, officials from the Russian designated local authority told the RIA news agency.
Ukraine’s new military attack came after several weeks of relative stagnation in a war that has killed thousands, displaced millions, destroyed cities and provoked a global food and energy crisis amid unprecedented economic sanctions.
The Russian bombardment of Mykolaiv killed at least two people, injured others 24 and leveled homes, according to city officials and witnesses. Read more
The conflict, the largest attack on a European state since 1945, had largely become in a war of attrition, mainly in the south and east, marked by artillery bombardment and air strikes.
Russia captured swaths of southern Ukraine near the Black Sea coast in its initial phase .
The Ukrainian Southern Command said its troops had launched offensive actions in several directions in the south, including in the Kherson region, which is located north of the Crimean peninsula annexed by Russia.
Ukraine attacked more than 10 sieges in the past week and “certainly weakened the enemy,” according to a spokeswoman who declined to give details of the counteroffensive, saying Russian forces in the south remained “quite powerful.”
Ukraine has been using sophisticated weapons supplied by the West to attack Russian ammunition depots and wreak havoc on supply lines.
The Russian Defense Ministry said that Ukrainian troops attempted an offensive in the southern regions of Mykolaiv and Kherson, but suffered significant casualties, the RIA news agency reported.
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