Russia’s onslaught ‘targeting arms resupply infrastructure’
Russia is carrying out strikes on infrastructure critical to Ukraine’s efforts to resupply its forces in their fight against the Kremlin’s invasion, Ukrainian officials and the Pentagon say.
A senior United States defence official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said Ukraine was still able to move weapons through the country.
Russia’s targets have included electrical substations, a railway facility and a bridge in two major cities in western and central Ukraine. Severe damage at three substations in Lviv, a critical hub for assistance entering the country from Eastern Europe, delayed trains and cut power to about a quarter of a million people.
Ukrainian economists said this week that the country has suffered up to US$600 billion (NZ$918b) in economic losses from Russia’s invasion, including US$92b (NZ$140b) worth of damage to hundreds of factories, medical facilities, schools, bridges, religious facilities, cars, warehouses, and other infrastructure.
Ukraine’s general staff said the country’s forces made some gains on the border of the southern regions of Kherson and Mykolaiv yesterday, and also repelled 11 attacks in the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
Heavy fighting was also raging at the Azovstal steel mill in Mariupol, the last stronghold of Ukrainian resistance in the ruined southern port city. The commander of the main Ukrainian military unit inside the plant said Russian troops had broken in.
The world is watching for whether Russian President Vladimir Putin will use the May 9 Victory Day parade in Moscow to declare victory in Ukraine or expand what he calls the ‘‘special military operation’’.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed the speculation as ‘‘nonsense’’.
■ The Belarusian military has launched large-scale drills to test the readiness of its armed forces to respond quickly to ‘‘possible crises’’ and counter threats from the air and ground, its Defence Ministry says.
Belarus said the training exercise would not ‘‘pose any threat to the European community as a whole or to neighbouring countries in particular’’. The country borders Ukraine to its south, Poland to its west, and Lithuania and Latvia to its north.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, allowed Russian troops to assemble and conduct military drills in Belarus in the run-up to Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24.