Ukraine hits Russian targets in Kherson

Ukraine said yesterday it had launched new air strikes on Russian positions in the captured southern region of Kherson as President Volodymyr Zelensky insisted Kyiv's forces were "holding on" in the east of the country.

Ukraine is trying to carry out a counterattack in Kherson, one of the first areas to be taken by Russia after the February 24 invasion, as Kyiv's troops struggle in the eastern Donbas region.

Russian President Vladimir Putin meanwhile compared his current actions to Peter the Great's against Sweden 300 years ago, saying the tsar "wasn't taking anything, he was taking it back".

Zelensky said in his evening address that several "cities in Donbas, which the occupiers now consider key targets, are holding on".

He added that Ukrainian forces have made positive strides in the Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv regions outside Donbas, and are in the process of "liberating our land".

He also appealed for his country not to be left in a "grey zone" with its EU membership bid, ahead of a summit set to decide on its candidacy.

Ukraine's defence ministry said yesterday it had struck Russian military positions in Kherson, which is just north of the Crimean peninsula that was annexed by Russia in 2014, and among the first regions seized by Russia in February.

"Our aircraft carried out a series of strikes on enemy bases, places of accumulation of equipment and personnel, and field depots around five different settlements in the Kherson region," it said in a statement.

The devastated eastern port of Mariupol, under siege by Russian troops for months until it fell, is now at risk of a major cholera outbreak, Britain's defence ministry said yesterday.

There is likely a critical shortage of medicines in Kherson, the ministry said in a Twitter update. Russia is struggling to provide basic public services to the population in Russian-occupied territories, it added.

The fiercest fighting remains around the eastern industrial city of Severodonetsk, a battle that Zelensky has said is pivotal for the fate of the Donbas region.

Local governor Sergiy Gaiday said yesterday that Russian forces had destroyed a major sports centre, adding: "One of the symbols of Severodonetsk was destroyed. The Ice Palace burned down."

People in the town of Lysychansk, which is located just across a river from Severodonetsk, spoke to AFP about the stark choices the war has forced on them: either stay and brave the shelling, or flee and abandon their homes.

Western countries meanwhile reacted with outrage after pro-Russian rebels in the east sentenced one Moroccan and two British fighters to death on Thursday after they were captured while fighting for Ukraine.

Separatist authorities in the Donetsk region of the Donbas ordered the death penalty for Aiden Aslin, Shaun Pinner and Saadun Brahim, Russian media reported.