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Kyiv, Ukraine (AP) — Russia attacked the Ukrainian president’s hometown and other targets Sunday with suicide drones, and Ukraine completely recaptured a strategic city in the east in a counteroffensive that reshaped the war.
Russia’s loss of the eastern city of Lyman, which it used as a transportation and logistics hub, remains a major blow to the Kremlin in its attempt to escalate the war by illegally annexing 4 regions of Ukraine and expanding threats to use nuclear force.
READ MORE: Putin says Ukrainian regions are Russia’s, challenges West as NATO talks intensify
The land of Russian President Vladimir Putin has threatened to take the standoff to a harmful new level. It has also led Ukraine to officially apply for accelerated NATO membership.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced on Sunday that his forces now controlled Lyman: “As of 12:30 (09:30 GMT) Lyman is exonerated. Thank you to our army, to our warriors,” he said in a video message.
The Russian military did not comment on Lyman on Sunday, after pronouncing on Saturday that it would lead its forces there to more favorable positions.
The British military described the acquisition of Lyman as a “significant political setback” for Moscow, and Ukraine gave the impression of temporarily capitalizing on its profits.
Hours after Zelenskyy’s announcement, Ukrainian media shared a symbol of Ukrainian troops with the country’s yellow and blue flag in front of a statue marking the village of Torske, 15 kilometers (9 miles) east of Lyman and within view of Russians. Luhansk region.
Soon after, a video posted online showed a Ukrainian soldier saying that Kyivan forces had begun attacking the town of Kreminna, across the border in Luhansk. The outgoing artillery can be heard in the background. Russian army correspondents also reported on the Ukrainian attacks on the Kreminna.
In another online photo, a Ukrainian soldier stood in front of a giant watermelon landmark just south of the village of Novovorontsovka, on the banks of the Dnieper River, along the Russian-controlled province at the northern tip of Kherson. A Ukrainian flag flew over the statue as several deactivated landmines stood next to it.
While Ukrainian forces did not recognize a breakthrough, writers close to the Russian military described a new Kyiv offensive in the Kherson region.
In southern Ukraine, Zelenskyy’s hometown of Krivyi Rih was attacked via Russia via a suicide drone that destroyed two floors of a school early Sunday, the regional governor said. Ukraine’s air force said Sunday it shot down five Iranian-made drones overnight, while two others controlled to break through air defenses.
A car carrying 4 men searching for mushrooms in Ukraine’s Chernihiv region hit a mine, killing everyone inside, the government said Sunday.
Army activity reports may simply not be verified.
Ukrainian forces have retaken swathes of territory, in the northeast around Kharkiv, in a counteroffensive in recent weeks that embarrassed the Kremlin and prompted few internal complaints about Putin’s war.
Lyman, which Ukraine regained by surrounding Russian troops, is located in the Donetsk region near the border with Luhansk, two of the four regions Russia illegally annexed on Friday after forcing what was left of the population to vote in referendums at gunpoint.
In his evening speech, Zelenskyy said: “Over the past week, there have been more Ukrainian flags in Donbass. In a week, there will be even more. “
In a daily intelligence briefing on Sunday, Britain’s Ministry of Defense called Lyman very important because he has “a key direction across the Siversky Donets River, which Russia has tried to bolster for its defenses. “
Russia’s withdrawal from northeastern Ukraine in recent weeks has revealed evidence of widespread torture and regime of civilians and soldiers, adding in the strategic city of Izium, according to an Associated Press investigation.
READ MORE: 10 torture sites in one city: Russia sowed pain and in Izium
PA records 10 torture sites in the city, adding a deep grave in a residential complex, a sweaty underground criminal who reeked of urine, a medical clinic and a kindergarten.
Recent developments have raised fears of an all-out confrontation between Russia and the West.
Putin presents Ukraine’s recent achievements, such as post-Soviet expansion of NATO, as an orchestrated effort by the United States to destroy Russia, and last week reinforced threats of nuclear force in part of his harshest and highest anti-Western rhetoric to date.
Nine NATO members from Central and Eastern Europe, fearing that Russia’s aggression may also target them, issued a letter to Ukraine on Sunday.
The leaders of the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Poland, Romania and Slovakia issued a joint statement on Sunday in support of Ukraine’s path to NATO club and called on the 30-member U. S. -led security bloc to speed up army aid for Kyiv.
Germany’s defense minister announced Sunday the delivery of wheeled armored howitzers produced in Slovakia to Ukraine next year. The weapons will be jointly financed by Denmark, Norway and Germany.
Russia moved forward Sunday with moves to make its land grab look like a legal process for those allegedly persecuted in Kyiv, with final approval by the Constitutional Court and spending submitted to the Kremlin-friendly parliament.
WATCH: Putin vows to protect illegally seized regions in Ukraine through ‘all available means’
Outside Russia, the Kremlin’s moves have been widely denounced for violating foreign laws, with several EU countries summoning Russian ambassadors since Putin signed Moscow-backed annexation treaties in southern and eastern Ukraine on Friday.
Meanwhile, considerations are developing about the fate of Europe’s largest nuclear force plant after Russian forces arrested its director for alleged interrogation.
The International Atomic Energy Agency said Sunday that its director general, Rafael Grossi, will travel to Kyiv and Moscow in the coming days to discuss the scenario around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. The site.
The Zaporizhzhia plant is located in one of the 4 regions that Moscow illegally annexed on Friday and has been continuously caught in the crossfire of war. an injunction.
On Sunday, Pope Francis denounced Russia’s nuclear threats and called on Putin to avoid “this spiral of violence and death. “
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