Ukraine 'breaks through Russian lines' in new counter-attack on Kherson

Ukraine claims it has made a significant breakthrough in a major counter-offensive around the southern city of Kherson.

President Volodymyr Zelensky urged Russian troops to flee for their lives – even as Russia claimed the assault in occupied territory had failed.

It has been suggested that the attack is only possible thanks to sophisticated weaponry being supplied by the West.

The new offensive follows weeks of virtual stalemate in the war, which has already killed countless thousands, displaced millions, destroyed cities and caused a global energy and food crisis.

Worries of a nuclear disaster are also simmering after shelling near Europe’s largest nuclear plant, Zaporizhzhia, continued.

In his nightly address yesterday evening, Zelensky did not directly mention the offensive but vowed that Ukrainian troops would chase the Russian army ‘to the border’.

He said: ‘If they want to survive – it’s time for the Russian military to run away. Go home.

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‘Ukraine is taking back its own.’

The city is strategically important and retaking it would be a major coup for Ukraine after reports of sham referenda to try to annex the region.

Oleksiy Arestovych, a senior adviser to the Ukrainian President, added that Russian defences had been ‘broken through in a few hours’.

He explained that Ukrainian forces were shelling ferries that Russia was using to supply a pocket of territory on the west bank of the Dnipro river in the Kherson region.

Ukraine’s Suspilne public broadcaster reported explosions in the Kherson area, while residents on social media reported gunfire and explosions but said it was not clear who was firing.

Russia’s defence ministry said Ukrainian troops had attempted an offensive in the Mykolaiv and Kherson regions but sustained significant casualties, RIA news agency reported.

The ‘enemy’s offensive attempt failed miserably’, it claimed.

Russia captured much of the south of the country early on in the fighting.

But a Ukrainian barrage of rockets left the Russian-occupied town of Nova Kakhovka without water or power, officials at the Russian-appointed authority told RIA.

Battlefield reports were unverifiable.

Russian attack on the nearby port city of Mykolaiv – which has remained under Ukrainian control despite repeated bombardment, killed at least two people, wounded around 24 and destroyed homes, city officials and witnesses said on Monday.

The owner of a family home directly next to a school, Olexandr Shulga, said he had lived there his whole life and that his wife died when she was buried in debris.

The conflict, which began in February, has largely settled into a war of attrition, mainly in the south and east, marked by artillery bombardments and air strikes.

But now Ukraine’s southern command has confirmed that its troops had launched offensive actions in several directions, including in the Kherson region.

Ukraine had struck more than 10 sites in the past week and ‘unquestionably weakened the enemy’, according to a spokeswoman who declined to give details of the offensive.

But she conceded that Russian forces in the south remained ‘quite powerful’.

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