Ukraine reports fierce fighting in northeast

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Russia's military said it had halted Ukrainian forces in the northeast. The military also said it brought down down three Ukrainian drones which had tried to strike Moscow and damaged a high-rise building reported to house government offices. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy described Sunday as «a good day, a powerful day» at the front, particularly near Bakhmut, where Ukrainian forces say they are retaking ground lost when Russian forces took the city in May.Ukraine did not directly claim responsibility for the drone attacks but Zelenskiy said the war was «gradually returning to Russia's territory — to its symbolic centres».

Russian forces launched the latest in a series of night-time air attacks, striking what officials said was a «non-residential building» in the northeastern city of Kharkiv. The hit started a fire but there were no reports of casualties. Zelenskiy reported that the death toll in a Russian strike on a school in the northern town of Sumy on Saturday had risen to two after rescue teams cleared rubble from the site.

Ukrainian Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar said Russian forces were «trying to drive us out» of elevated positions in the northeast occupied by Moscow after its February 2022 invasion, but retaken later by Ukrainian troops. The Russians' key task, she told national television, was to «divert our forces from the Bakhmut area, where we have a successful offensive». «They have attacked endlessly this week.

But our troops resist the attacks and sometimes push them back with heavy losses,» she said. Maliar said the Russians had suffered «no fewer losses than during the heated battles in Bakhmut», which fell to Russian forces after more than 10 months of fighting. Ukraine last month