A Russian village, near the Ukrainian border, was the scene of fighting on Sunday after a new incursion by pro-Ukrainian forces, while Moscow continued its campaign of aerial bombardments. The governor of the Russian region of Belgorod, targeted in recent days by Ukrainian bombardment, indicated on Telegram that “fights” were taking place in the village of Novaya Tavoljanka.
“A sabotage group has arrived, now there is fighting in Novaya Tavoljanka,” Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said. I hope they will all be destroyed. He added that the attackers, whom he described as Russian fighters engaged on the side of kyiv, had taken prisoners and offered an exchange.
“The only thing that prevents me from negotiating with them is our men who are in their hands, maybe they are already dead…” he wrote on this messenger. But if they are not, they can go from 5 p.m. (2 p.m. GMT) to 6 p.m. (3 p.m. GMT) at the Shebekino border post. I guarantee security. »
He had called on Sunday morning the inhabitants of his region to evacuate the areas subjected to bombardments which have intensified in recent days. This new incursion by pro-Ukrainian forces into Russian territory comes after major airstrikes hit central Ukraine, one killing a two-year-old girl on Saturday evening and injuring 22 people in Dnipro, the other affecting an airfield on Sunday, according to Ukrainian authorities.
During the day, the Russian army claimed to have carried out strikes on the night of Saturday to Sunday against Ukrainian military airfields, claiming to have hit command centers and equipment. “Overnight, the Russian armed forces carried out a combined strike with long-range and high-precision weapons from the sky against enemy installations at military airfields,” the Russian Defense Ministry said.
For his part, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused the Russians of “attacking the city” of Dnipro on Saturday evening and claimed that other victims remained trapped in the rubble of two apartment buildings. Russian airstrikes over Ukraine have intensified in recent weeks, as have Ukrainian incursions into Russia.
For months, Kiev has claimed to be preparing for a major offensive against occupying Moscow forces in an effort to recapture territories lost after Russia’s February 2022 invasion. Saturday’s strike destroyed two buildings in a residential area of Dnipro, as well as ten houses, a store and a gas line, according to the governor of the Dnipro region, Serhiy Lysak.
“Overnight, the body of a girl was recovered from the rubble of a house” in the Pidhorodnenska district, “she had just turned two,” he posted on the social network Telegram on Sunday. In addition, “22 people were injured, including five children”, he added in his latest assessment of the attack on the Dnipro district. Of these children, “doctors consider the condition of three boys to be serious. They’re in the operating room.” On Facebook, the Ukrainian president posted a video showing rescuers digging through the rubble, to the sound of jackhammers.
On Sunday, Ukrainian authorities also announced that an airfield had been hit by a Russian strike near the town of Kropyvnytskyi in the center of the country. “Six missiles and five attack drones” were launched by Russian forces, Ukrainian Air Force spokesman Yuriy Ignat said on television.
In Kyiv, the head of the local military administration said beforehand that the capital’s air defenses repelled several missiles and drones overnight. “According to preliminary information, no air targets have reached the capital,” Serhiy Popko wrote on the social network Telegram on Sunday.
On the Russian side, artillery fire has pushed thousands of people to take refuge in Belgorod, the regional capital, in recent days. One of them, Yevgueni Klyoutchnikov, a resident of Chebekino, 30 kilometers away, believes that his town now looks like a ghost town dotted with bomb craters.
“If the government does not help us to rebuild and does not give us housing, all the inhabitants (of Chebekino) will be homeless”, declared to AFP this handler met at the end of the week in a center of Belgorod accommodation. The mayor of this city, Valentin Demidov, claimed that around 5,000 people fleeing the bombings had registered with the authorities.