Ukraine claims it has
broken through Russian lines in a major new counter-offensive in the south as Kyiv
forces go on the attack against the invading troops.
The ‘Kakhova’ Ukrainian
military group said it had seen ‘the retreat’ of pro-Russian separatist
fighters from their positions in Kherson.
Russian forces seized Kherson
on March 3, the first major city to fall following Putin’s barbaric
invasion.
The southern military command
announced today they had carried out the long-awaited maneuver,
reflecting Kyiv’s growing confidence as Western military aid flows
in.
‘Today there was a powerful
artillery attack on enemy positions in … the entire territory of the occupied
Kherson region,’ Sergey Khlan, a local deputy and adviser to the regional
governor told Ukraine’s Pryamyi TV channel.
‘This is the announcement of
what we have been waiting for since the spring – it is the beginning of the
de-occupation of Kherson region.’
Khlan said Ukrainian troops
now had ‘the advantage’ on the southern front.
Several strikes in recent
weeks have targeted bridges in the region, in a bid to hamper logistics for the
Russian military.
