In Kyiv, Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has reported intense clashes between Ukrainian forces and the advancing Russian army in two border regions. Meanwhile, the death toll from a Russian apartment building collapse, blamed on Ukrainian shelling, has risen to 15.
Zelenskyy described the battles as "fierce" near the eastern and northeastern borders, where Ukrainian soldiers, facing superior numbers and firepower, are attempting to repel a significant Russian ground offensive. He stated, "Defensive battles are ongoing, fierce battles, on a large part of our border area," in his nightly video address on Sunday.
Analysts suggest that the Russian forces are seeking to exploit Ukrainian vulnerabilities before a substantial amount of new military aid from the U.S. and European partners reaches Kyiv in the coming weeks and months. This period is considered a window of opportunity for Moscow and one of the most perilous for Kyiv in the two-year war.
The recent Russian incursions into the northeastern Kharkiv region and the ongoing advances into the eastern Donetsk region follow months of stagnation along the approximately 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line. Both sides have resorted to long-range strikes in what has largely become a war of attrition.
The incursion into Kharkiv may be an attempt to establish a "buffer zone" to protect Belgorod, an adjacent Russian border region that has been heavily targeted by Ukrainian attacks.
In Belgorod's capital city, emergency services have completed the clearance of rubble from a collapsed section of a residential building caused by what authorities claim was Ukrainian shelling. Fifteen bodies were recovered from the debris, and 27 others were wounded. Additionally, three people in Belgorod were killed by shelling late Sunday.
Russian President Vladimir Putin recently replaced Sergei Shoigu as defense minister in a Cabinet reshuffle. Shoigu was a key figure in Putin's decision to send Russian troops into Ukraine in February 2022, an operation Russia had anticipated would swiftly overwhelm Ukraine's army and be greeted with widespread Ukrainian support.
Zelenskyy highlighted that the fighting in the Donetsk area is as intense as in Kharkiv. He accused the Kremlin of attempting to "spread our forces thin" by opening a second active front in Kharkiv. The area around the Pokrovsk region, just inside the Ukrainian border in Donetsk, was described as "the most difficult."
Prior to the war, Pokrovsk was a town of around 60,000 people and was only a two-hour drive from the front line. However, it is now less than half that distance. The capture of the Donetsk city of Avdiivka in February provided a gateway for Russian troops to advance westward into Donetsk. Russia illegally annexed Donetsk and three other regions in 2022 shortly after invading Ukraine, with taking control of all of Donetsk being one of the Kremlin's main war objectives.