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Russia-Ukraine war live: Ukrainian forces gradually advance on Bakhmut; four people injured after shelling in Kherson | Ukraine

Ukrainian forces continue to gradually advance on the flanks of Bakhmut in Donetsk oblast

Ukrainian forces continue to gradually advance on the flanks of Bakhmut in Donetsk oblast, the Eastern Command spokesperson Serhii Cherevatyi told national television today, the Kyiv Independent reports.

Ukrainian forces are “pressuring” Russian troops and liberating the territories, he said, though did not mention how far the military advanced, saying he would disclose it after the analysis on the ground.

Ukrainian forces are assaulting Russian positions on the southern and northern flanks, with a success near Klishchiivka and Kurdiumivka south of Bakhmut, it was reported.

Ukraine’s offensive operations near Bakhmut may force Russia to make a difficult decision on whether to pull defending forces from other regions of Ukraine, the Institute for the Study of War said in its latest analysis.

Russia has already deployed reinforcements to the Bakhmut area, where Ukrainians reported making headway in clawing back captured territory, according to the report.

Key events

That’s it from the Ukraine live blog for today. Thanks for following along.

For a summary of the day’s events, see this afternoon’s summary here.

Poland said it will send 500 police to shore up security at its border with Belarus to cope with rising numbers of migrants crossing as well as any potential threats after the Wagner group of mercenaries relocates to Belarus.

“Due to the tense situation on the border with Belarus I have decided to bolster our forces with 500 Polish police officers from preventive and counter-terrorism units,” minister of Interior Mariusz Kaminski wrote on his Twitter account.

The police force would join 5,000 border guards and 2,000 soldiers in securing the border, he said.

Poland has accused Belarus of artificially creating a migrant crisis on the border since 2021 by flying in people from the Middle East and Africa and attempting to push them across the frontier, Reuters reported.

Papal envoy Cardinal Matteo Zuppi said on Sunday his mission to Moscow on the Ukraine war was focused on humanitarian issues and had not involved any discussions of a peace plan.

Pope Francis had in May asked Zuppi, head of the Italian bishops’ conference, to carry out a peace mission to try to help end the war in Ukraine, Reuters reported.

Zuppi met one of President Putin’s advisers, Yuri Ushakov, and the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, in Moscow this week. Earlier in June, he also visited Kyiv for talks with President Zelenskiy.

All the meetings “were important, especially in humanitarian aspects, which are what we have focused on. There is not a peace plan, not a mediation,” Zuppi told Italy’s state broadcaster RAI.

“There is a big aspiration that the violence will end and that human life can be preserved, starting with the protection of the little ones,” he said, adding he would meet with the pope in the coming days to discuss the outcome of the meetings.

Dan Sabbagh

Two British peers were among 50 people who attended a party organised by the Russian ambassador to the UK at his opulent residence in west London last month, to mark the creation of a Russia independent of the Soviet Union.

Andrei Kelin, the Russian ambassador, spoke at the event where he sought to justify his country’s bloody invasion of Ukraine, while those attending included the Conservative Lord Balfe and cross-bencher Lord Skidelsky.

An account of the event published by the Sunday Times includes pictures of Kelin, who is banned from the UK parliament, addressing an audience of about 50, including Russian embassy staff, foreign diplomats and a number of Britons.

Kelin reportedly said “in order to develop normally, Russia must first deal with significant threats to its security” – a clear reference to Moscow’s attack on Ukraine last February aimed at overthrowing the elected government of Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

The ambassador also accused Britain of making a “big strategic miscalculation” by engaging in a confrontational approach to Moscow. The UK, alongside other western countries, has strongly supported Ukraine, providing arms and aid since the start of the war to help Kyiv restore its internationally recognised borders.

Afternoon summary

Key developments today:

  • Russia launched an overnight drone attack on Kyiv after a 12-day break, a Ukrainian military official said, with air defence systems destroying all targets on their approach. Ukraine’s air force said the attack included eight Iranian-made Shahed drones and three cruise missiles. One person was injured and three private houses were damaged.

  • Four civilians, including two in a direct hit on a high-rise building, have been injured by Russian shelling in the southern city of Kherson, the prosecutor general’s office said. The attack on the residential area occurred at about 11.20am local time, with Russian forces firing from the occupied east bank of the Dnipro River to attack the city.

  • Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, was in Odesa, where he paid tribute to those serving in the navy on Ukrainian Navy Day in a video posted on Twitter.

  • Ukrainian forces have continued to gradually advance on the flanks of Bakhmut in Donetsk oblast, the Eastern Command spokesperson Serhii Cherevatyi told national television. Ukrainian forces were “pressuring” Russian troops and liberating the territories, he said, though he did not mention how far the military had advanced, saying he would disclose it after the analysis on the ground.

  • Wagner group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin’s media holding company is to shut down, the director of one of its outlets said. Patriot Media, whose most prominent outlet was the RIA FAN news site, had taken a strongly nationalist, pro-Kremlin editorial line while also providing positive coverage of Prigozhin and the Wagner group. “I am announcing our decision to close down and to leave the country’s information space,” the RIA FAN director, Yevgeny Zubarev, said in a video clip posted late on Saturday on the holding company’s social media accounts. Zubarev gave no reason for the decision.

  • Poland will send 500 police officers to its border with Belarus, the Polish minister of the interior, Mariusz Kaminski, said. Last week, Warsaw announced a tightening of security because of concerns over the presence of the Wagner group in Belarus.

  • Forty diplomats and Russian embassy staff in Bucharest were to leave Romania on Saturday after a request from the government, with ties reportedly worsening between the two countries since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Eleven diplomats and 29 technical and administrative staff, accompanied by their families, “will leave Romania onboard a civilian aircraft belonging to a Russian airline”, the Romanian foreign ministry said.

  • The ultra-nationalist Liberal Democratic party of Russia is working on a bill that would temporarily ban the travel of close relatives of high-ranking officials to “unfriendly countries”, the RIA state news agency reported. Russia considers all countries that have imposed sanctions on it over the invasion of Ukraine to be “unfriendly”.

  • Russia has cancelled its 2023 Maks international airshow, probably over security concerns after recent uncrewed aerial vehicle attacks inside the country, according to the latest intelligence report from the UK Ministry of Defence.

Ukraine’s President Zelenskiy is in Odesa where he has paid tribute to those serving in the navy on Ukrainian Navy Day in a video posted on Twitter.

The enemy will definitely not dictate the conditions in the Black Sea, and 🇷🇺 occupiers will have to be as afraid of approaching our 🇺🇦Crimea and our Azov Sea coast as Russian ships are already afraid of approaching our Black Sea coast. I thank every warrior of the Ukrainian Navy… pic.twitter.com/lWQqDgRTCe

— Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) July 2, 2023

Four civilians injured after Russian shelling in Kherson, says Ukraine

More details on shelling in Kherson.

Four civilians, including two in a direct hit into a high-rise building, have been injured by Russian shelling in the southern city of Kherson, the prosecutor general’s office said on Sunday.

The attack on the residential area occurred at about 11.20am local time, with Russian forces firing from the occupied east bank of the Dnipro River to attack the city, the Kyiv Independent reports.

The attack also damaged the civilian infrastructure in the city, according to the report.

Kherson oblast, including the regional capital, has been shelled daily by Russian forces from the east bank of the Dnipro River since Ukrainian forces liberated the west bank during the counteroffensive campaign in the autumn of 2022.

Some of the latest images from Ukraine.

Girls play next to the memory wall of fallen defenders of the country in Kyiv
In Kyiv girls play next to the memory wall dedicated to Ukrainian fighters killed defending the country.
Photograph: Gleb Garanich/Reuters
An artist performs near an exhibition displaying destroyed Russian military vehicles in central Kyiv
An artist performs near an exhibition displaying destroyed Russian military vehicles in central Kyiv.
Photograph: Gleb Garanich/Reuters
A man rests in a garden in central Kyiv
A man rests in a garden in central Kyiv. Photograph: Gleb Garanich/Reuters

Ukrainian forces continue to gradually advance on the flanks of Bakhmut in Donetsk oblast

Ukrainian forces continue to gradually advance on the flanks of Bakhmut in Donetsk oblast, the Eastern Command spokesperson Serhii Cherevatyi told national television today, the Kyiv Independent reports.

Ukrainian forces are “pressuring” Russian troops and liberating the territories, he said, though did not mention how far the military advanced, saying he would disclose it after the analysis on the ground.

Ukrainian forces are assaulting Russian positions on the southern and northern flanks, with a success near Klishchiivka and Kurdiumivka south of Bakhmut, it was reported.

Ukraine’s offensive operations near Bakhmut may force Russia to make a difficult decision on whether to pull defending forces from other regions of Ukraine, the Institute for the Study of War said in its latest analysis.

Russia has already deployed reinforcements to the Bakhmut area, where Ukrainians reported making headway in clawing back captured territory, according to the report.

A Ukrainian commander has claimed the highly mobile French AMX-10 RC infantry fighting vehicles – sometimes described as light tanks – are “impractical” for frontline attacks, claiming one four-man crew has already died because of the vehicle’s thin armour.

President Zelenskiy of Ukraine thanked France’s President Macron for sending light combat tanks to Kyiv, and Oleksiy Reznikov, Ukraine’s defence minister, was filmed riding in one.

Kyiv said in April that the French vehicles – designed for armed reconnaissance and attacks on enemy tanks – were already in service.

But AFP reports that a 34-year-old battalion commander within the 37th Marine Brigade, who uses the call sign Spartanets, said the tanks’ “thin armour” means they can be used as fire support, but not in frontline assaults.

“Unfortunately, there was one case when the crew died in the vehicle,” the major told AFP.

“There was artillery shelling and a shell exploded near the vehicle, the fragments pierced the armour and the ammunition set detonated.” The crew of four inside were all killed, he said.

“The guns are good, the observation devices are very good. But unfortunately there is thin armour and it is impractical to use them in the front line (attack),” Spartanets said.

The battalion commander reportedly compared the French-built vehicles unfavourably with MRAP-type armoured vehicles such as the US’s Oshkosh and Britain’s Husky, which he said could resist a direct strike by rocket-propelled grenades.

Several people injured after Russian shelling on Kherson, says Ukraine

Russian shelling hit a residential area in Kherson on 2 July, injuring several people, according to the regional military administration’s report as of 12pm, the Kyiv Independent reports.

A high-rise residential building, a pharmacy and a restaurant were struck by the shelling. The victims, now being treated in hospital, include a 50-year-old man.

Heavy combat is said to be continuing in Kherson, near the destroyed Antonivsky Bridge over the Dnieper river.

Russia launched an overnight drone attack on the Ukrainian capital after a 12-day break, a Ukrainian military official said, with air defence systems destroying all targets on their approach.

In video footage, blasts resembling the sound of air defence systems hitting targets could be heard, and orange flashes were visible in the sky, but there was no immediate information about the scale of the attack.

Russia launches overnight drone attack on Kyiv – video

Wagner chief’s media holding group to shut down

Yevgeny Prigozhin’s media holding group is to shut down, the director of one of its outlets said, highlighting the mercenary chief’s worsening fortunes a week after the collapse of a brief mutiny staged by his Wagner Group fighters, Reuters reports.

Under a deal that halted the mutiny, Prigozhin, a former ally of President Vladimir Putin, was allowed to go into exile in Belarus and his men given the choice of joining him, being integrated into Russia’s armed forces or returning home.

Patriot Media, whose most prominent outlet was the RIA FAN news site, had taken a strongly nationalist, pro-Kremlin editorial line, while also providing positive coverage of Prigozhin and his Wagner Group.

“I am announcing our decision to close down and to leave the country’s information space,” the RIA FAN director, Yevgeny Zubarev, said in a video clip posted late on Saturday on the holding’s social media accounts. Zubarev gave no reason for the decision.

The Russian newspaper Kommersant reported on Friday that the country’s communications watchdog Roskomnadzor had blocked media outlets linked to Prigozhin, without elaborating. The watchdog could not be reached on Sunday for comment, Reuters said.

Russian media have also reported that a “troll factory” allegedly used by Prigozhin to influence public opinion in foreign countries including the US had been disbanded.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2023/jul/02/russia-ukraine-war-live-russia-launches-first-overnight-drone-strike-on-kyiv-in-12-days Russia-Ukraine war live: Ukrainian forces gradually advance on Bakhmut; four people injured after shelling in Kherson | Ukraine

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