Counter-offensive by Ukrainian forces and heavy Russian bombing, southern Ukraine remained at the heart of the conflict overnight from Monday to Tuesday. This counter-attack is essentially aimed at retaking Kherson, a city of 280,000 inhabitants before the conflict, which fell into Russian hands at the start of the war on February 24.
“Ukrainian armed forces launched their offensive in several areas in the south. We ask the residents of Kherson to follow the safety instructions, ”wrote on Telegram the head of the regional administration Yaroslav Yanuchevych.
“Today there were powerful artillery attacks on enemy positions (…) throughout the territory of the occupied Kherson region. This is the announcement of what we have been waiting for since the spring: it is the beginning of the end of the occupation of the Kherson region,” MP Serguiï Khlan announced on Ukrainian television.
Russia for its part claimed to have repelled Ukrainian “offensive attempts” in the regions of Kherson and Mykolaiv, also in the south.