Russia has targeted Ukraine’s Black Sea regions of Odesa and Mykolaiv with air strikes, hitting private buildings and port infrastructure along the country’s southern coast, the Ukrainian military said.
The Kremlin’s forces used air-launched missiles in the attack, Ukraine’s Operational Command South said in a Facebook post.
In the Odesa region, a number of private buildings in villages on the coast were hit and caught fire, the report said.
In the Mykolaiv region, port infrastructure was targeted.
Hours after the renewed strikes on the south, a Moscow-installed official in the southern Kherson region said the Odesa and Mykolaiv regions will soon be “liberated” by the Russian forces, just like the Kherson region further east.
“The Kherson region and the city of Kherson have been liberated forever,” Kirill Stremousov was quoted as saying by Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.
Meanwhile, Russia’s top diplomat repeated his insistence that Moscow was ready to hold talks with Ukraine on ending the war, though he once again claimed that Kyiv’s western allies oppose a deal.
“We never refused to have talks, because everybody knows that any hostilities end at the negotiating table,” Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday during a trip to Uganda.
He said negotiations have gone no further since a meeting between the two sides in Istanbul at the end of March.
While Ukrainian officials have spoken of a possible counteroffensive in the south, the British Ministry of Defence (MoD) said on Tuesday there was no indication a Ukrainian warship and a stockpile of anti-ship missiles were at Odesa’s port, as Moscow claimed when it struck the site over the weekend.
The MoD said Russia sees Ukraine’s use of anti-ship missiles as “a key threat” that is limiting its Black Sea Fleet.
“This has significantly undermined the overall invasion plan, as Russia cannot realistically attempt an amphibious assault to seize Odesa,” it said.
Latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine - 26 July 2022
Find out more about the UK government's response: https://t.co/tudEgSjS5H
🇺🇦 #StandWithUkraine 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/ddsfUTa1Gg— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) July 26, 2022
“Russia will continue to prioritise efforts to degrade and destroy Ukraine’s anti-ship capability.”
It added that “Russia’s targeting processes are highly likely routinely undermined by dated intelligence, poor planning, and a top-down approach to operations”.
Russian shelling over the previous 24 hours killed at least three civilians and wounded eight more in Ukraine, the president’s office said on Tuesday.
In the eastern Donetsk region, where the fighting has been focused in recent weeks, the shelling continued along the entire front line, with the largest cities of the region, including Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Toretsk, being targeted by the Russian forces, a statement said.
Donetsk regional governor Pavlo Kyrylenko accused Russian troops of using cluster munitions and repeated his call for civilians to evacuate.
“There is not a single safe place left, everything is being shelled,” Mr Kyrylenko said in televised remarks.
“But there are still evacuation routes for the civilian population.”
The Institute for the Study of War, based in Washington DC, reported that the Russians are using mercenaries from the shadowy Wagner Group to capture the Vuhledar Power Plant on the northern outskirts of the Novoluhanske village.
But the Russian forces have made “limited gains” there, according to Ukraine’s General Staff.
The main Russian focus has been on capturing Bakhmut.
“Russian forces made marginal gains south of Bakhmut but are unlikely to be able to effectively leverage these advances to take full control of Bakhmut itself,” the Institute for the Study of War said.
Russian forces continued to launch strikes on civilian infrastructure in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city in the north-east, and the surrounding region.
Kharkiv governor Oleh Syniehubov said the strikes on the city resumed around dawn on Tuesday, damaging a car dealership.
“The Russians deliberately target civilian infrastructure objects – hospitals, schools, movie theatres,” Mr Syniehubov told Ukrainian television.
“Everything is being fired at, even queues for humanitarian aid, so we’re urging people to avoid mass gatherings.”
German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock said that Moscow wants “the complete subjugation of Ukraine and its people”.
“We must be prepared for this war – which Russia is conducting with absolute brutality, and is conducting in a way that no-one else would – to last months,” Ms Baerbock said during a visit to Prague.
In other developments on Tuesday:
– European Union governments agreed to ration natural gas this winter to protect themselves against any further supply cuts by Russia. EU energy ministers approved a draft law designed to lower demand for gas by 15% from August through to March. The legislation entails voluntary national steps to reduce gas consumption and, if they yield insufficient savings, a trigger for mandatory actions. The energy ministers approved the draft a day after Russian energy corporation Gazprom said it would cut gas flows through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany to 20% of capacity starting on Wednesday.
– Russia’s space chief says the country will opt out of the International Space Station after 2024 and focus on building its own orbiting outpost. Yuri Borisov, who was appointed earlier this month to lead the state-controlled space corporation Roscosmos, said Russia would fulfil its obligations at the International Space Station before it leaves the project. Mr Borisov’s statement reaffirmed previous declarations by Russian space officials amid soaring tensions between Russia and the West over the Kremlin’s military action in Ukraine.
– Britain said it has imposed sanctions on two Russian government officials overseeing justice and two top officials in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine. Also facing sanctions are several Syrian military figures accused of recruiting Syrians to fight for Russia in Ukraine.
– German defence minister Christine Lambrecht said her country has delivered Mars II multiple-launch rocket systems along with three more howitzers to Ukraine. Germany pledged last month to send the equipment to Ukraine. Ms Lambrecht said Germany has also delivered five Gepard self-propelled armoured anti-aircraft guns so far, German news agency dpa reported. It has pledged a total of 30.
