Ukraine updates: Russia retains up strain close to Kharkiv

The Ukrainian navy has said that Ukrainian forces have sunk a minesweeper from Russia’s Crimea-based Black Sea Fleet, adding to the growing list of Russian vessels destroyed during Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

 “Last night the Ukrainian Defence Forces destroyed the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s Project 266-M Kovrovets minesweeper,” the navy said on the Telegram messaging app.

Kyiv says it has destroyed a third of Russia’s vessels in the Black Sea since Moscow launched its offensive over two years ago.

Moscow officials have tended to remain silent about most of Ukraine’s claims in this regard, but losses of sometimes key Russian vessels have been confirmed by Russian military bloggers and media.

Ukraine attacked Russian regions with over 100 drones and 12 ATACMS missiles overnight to Sunday, Russian officials said, with the Defense Ministry claiming all were shot down.

Some drones were flying over the Belgorod region bordering Ukraine, with others reported over the southwestern Krasnodar region, the ministry said.

It said twelve US-made ATACMS missiles were downed over Russian-annexed Crimea.

Officials in Slyvyansk in the Krasnodar region said six drones crashed near an oil refinery there, with Russia’s Interfax news agency saying work was halted at the facility.

Russia has reported a rise in Ukrainian attacks on its territory since its forces opened a new front in northeastern Ukraine’s Kharkiv region earlier this month.

In Ukraine, air force officials said the country’s air defense had shot down all of the 37 Russian drones sent to attack overnight.

At least four people were killed in an attack on the outskirts of Ukraine’s second-largest city of Kharkiv on Sunday as Russia pushed ahead with its renewed offensive in the northeast of its neighbor. 

“We know about four civilians killed. At least eight people are wounded,” the regional governor, Oleg Synegubov, said. 

The shelling struck in a busy lakeside restaurant area in the northeast of the city.

“The occupiers attacked the area where local residents were relaxing,” he said on the Telegram messaging app.

Russia launched an assault in the border region of Kharkiv on May 10, having first stepped up its aerial attacks.