The Russian special military operation in Ukraine continues today, Tuesday, as the Russian army continues to strike the positions of Ukrainian forces and military infrastructure and liberate the territory of Donbass, while Kyiv continues to receive Western support against the Russian army.
More US funding appears to be on the way, with sources saying that members of Congress debating a temporary spending bill have agreed to include about $12 billion in new military and economic aid to Ukraine.
Ukrainian and Russian forces fought fierce fighting in different regions of Ukraine, with the referendums organized by Russia in four regions that it hopes to annex to it near its end today.
British intelligence said that Russian President Vladimir Putin will address the Kremlin next Friday, stressing that there are expectations that Putin will announce to the Kremlin the accession of Ukrainian regions to Russia.
For his part, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that the Donetsk region in the east It remains a top strategic priority for his countryAnd Russia, too, as fighting raged in several towns as Russian forces tried to advance south and west.
Clashes also took place in the northeastern Kharkiv region, the focus of Ukraine’s counter-offensive this month. Ukrainian forces continued a campaign to decommission four bridges and other river crossings with the aim of disrupting the supply lines of Russian forces in the south.
Moscow hopes to annex the regions of Kherson, Lugansk, Donetsk and Zaporizhia, in the east and south, which make up about 15 percent of Ukraine.
None of those areas are under Moscow’s full control, and fighting continues along the entire front line, as Ukrainian forces have announced further advances since they defeated Russian forces in a fifth district, Kharkiv, earlier this month.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has tacitly threatened to use nuclear weapons to protect his country’s territory, which would include the four regions if annexed.
Voting on its annexation to Russia began on Friday and is due to end on Tuesday, with the Russian parliament likely to approve the annexation within days.
Kyiv and the West reject the referendums as sham, vowing not to recognize the results.
In Russia, about 300,000 soldiers from the reserve forces were called up.
Russia considers millions of former conscripts to have officially reservists. The authorities did not say exactly who would be summoned, because this part of the order issued by Putin is confidential.
And late on Monday evening, Zelensky described the military situation in Donetsk It is “extremely dangerous”.
“We are doing everything we can to contain the enemy’s activity. This is our first goal now because Donbass is still the first target of the occupiers,” he said, referring to the wider region that includes Donetsk and Luhansk.
The Odessa administration said Russia had carried out at least five attacks on targets in the region using Iranian drones in the past few days.