Team News Riveting
Even as Russia is moving ahead after launching a full-scale war in Ukraine, its army Thursday that Ukrainian troops were abandoning their posts while footage showing widespread missile strikes on its facilities.
Ukraine’s military has reported several casualties in the early attacks that stretched from its eastern breakaway regions. “Intelligence data show that the Ukrainian army’s units and servicemen are leaving their positions en masse and abandoning weapons,” the RBC news website quoted Russia’s Defense Ministry as saying.
It added that Russia is not attacking “the positions of Ukrainian army units that have laid down their arms.”
Ukrainian authorities have not confirmed the claims but said its defenders have repelled the attack on the town of Shchastia, Luhansk region. Fifty Russian mercenaries were killed, Ukraine claimed.
“The town of Shchastia (Luhansk region), which was attacked by the Russian aggressor, is regained. When trying to attack, the equipment was destroyed and about 50 enemies were killed,” the Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security posted on Facebook.
At about 05:00, the state border of Ukraine in the sections near the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus was attacked by Russian troops supported by Belarus. Attacks on border units, border patrols, and checkpoints are carried out with the use of artillery, heavy equipment, and small arms in Luhansk, Sumy, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, and Zhytomyr regions.
In addition, the attack is carried out from the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions and from the Autonomous Republic of Crimea. The activity of enemy sabotage and reconnaissance groups is also observed. Information on casualties among border guards is being clarified.
As of 07:00, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reported that the Armed Forces had shot down 5 planes and 1 helicopter of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Meanwhile, Russia’s ground forces later in the day crossed into Ukraine from several directions, Ukraine’s border guard service said. Russian tanks and other heavy equipment crossed the frontier in several northern regions, as well as from the Kremlin-annexed peninsula of Crimea in the south.
However, Russia has officially claimed one casualty during action.
(The update on the Russia-Ukraine war to follow)
