Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday visited the eastern front near Kupyansk, which has been threatened for several months by Russian attacks whose bombings killed six civilians in eastern and southern Ukraine.
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In the 22nd month of a largely frozen conflict in the south and east following a summer Ukrainian counteroffensive without a major breakthrough, President Zelensky visited a command post near Kupyansk in the Kharkiv region (northeast).
“I wish you victory, be strong and do not lose the initiative,” he said during a ceremony of awards to soldiers, according to a video released by the presidency.
In the evening, he said he had attended two meetings with the military on defense installations, while Russian troops had regained the initiative in recent months by launching attacks near Koupiansk and Avdiivka in the east.
According to Zelensky, the discussion focused on “all important areas where we need to stimulate and accelerate the construction of defense structures.”
He had already visited this region at the beginning of October, which was the target of Russian attacks in the summer and where the Ukrainian authorities then called on the population living nearby to evacuate this sector.
The Russian Defense Ministry said on Thursday that it had repelled “two attacks” by the Ukrainian army near the village of Synkivka, less than 10 km from Kupiansk, with the help of artillery and aircraft.
An injured baby
Nighttime Russian bombings left at least two people dead and 10 injured – including four children – in three towns near the eastern city of Avdiivka, which Moscow forces have been trying to surround and capture for nearly two months.
According to the Ukrainian Interior Minister, a total of six S-300 missiles hit the cities of Pokrovsk, Myrnograd and Novogrodivka, which are located about forty kilometers northwest of Avdiivka.
In Novogrodivka, the bodies of two men were found under the rubble of a residential building where emergency services were still searching for three other missing people, including a child, emergency services said in a new report.
In Pokrovsk, a six-month-old baby and two boys aged 16 and 13 were injured, the minister said.
Since mid-October, the industrial city of Avdiivka has been subjected to incessant attacks from Moscow troops stationed east, north and south of the city.
In the Avdiivka sector, “the enemy continues its active ground infantry attacks (…) In some places it uses armored vehicles,” said Oleksandr Tarnavsky, the Ukrainian commander in charge of the area.
Prisoner exchange blocked
Elsewhere in Ukraine, the Russian army continued its bombing, causing casualties primarily among the civilian population.
According to local authorities, three people were killed in the morning in the Kherson region (south) by artillery fire on the village of Sadové, controlled by Ukrainian forces, on the right bank of the Dnieper River.
Finally, in Toretsk in the east, one person was killed and three injured in a Russian attack in the evening with two KAB-250 bombs, according to the regional prosecutor’s office.
The Ukrainian Air Force also said Thursday morning it had shot down 14 of the 20 Russian attack drones launched overnight over the country’s southern, eastern and central regions.
Ukrainian forces have repelled more than 20 Russian attacks on several towns and villages around Avdiivka and captured dozens of Russian soldiers over the past month, according to Oleksandr Tarnavsky.
On the issue of prisoners of war, Ukraine’s human rights commissioner on Thursday accused Russia of blocking all exchanges between the two countries while thousands are believed to be held by both sides and the last exchange took place last August, according to media reports.
“The exchange is not taking place because Russia doesn’t want it,” Dmytro Loubinets, human rights commissioner of the Ukrainian parliament, said on Telegram.
He stated in August that Kiev had managed to recover nearly 2,600 of its prisoners since the Russian invasion began in February 2022.