Russian aviation continues to bombard the Ukrainian military airports for the fifth day in a row, with the aim of paralyzing the Ukrainian Air Force and securing air coverage of the ground progress. Clashes are taking place in Kyiv, especially on the northern side of the city.
The clashes that erupted at dawn on Monday focused on Shcherbakova Street, which is located 11 kilometers from the center of the Ukrainian capital.
And satellite images taken yesterday morning showed a large deployment of Russian ground forces, including hundreds of military vehicles, in a convoy northeast of the Ukrainian city of Ivankiv and moving towards Kiev - about 40 miles away.
The convoy, which stretches for more than three miles, carries fuel, logistics and armored vehicles.
The photos also revealed the recent air strikes on Antonov Airport in Hostomel, the damage caused by these strikes and the heavy fighting in and near the airport.
For its part, the State Service for Special Communications and Information Protection of Ukraine said that explosions were heard in the city of Kharkiv on Monday morning.
confrontation fronts
Several areas in the city, which is the second most important city in Ukraine, witnessed yesterday fierce battles between the Ukrainian and Russian forces.
After statements by the Russian forces saying that they had entered Kharkiv, the Ukrainian forces confirmed that they had full control of the city.
On the fourth day of Russia’s war on Ukraine, the battles were in more than one direction. Although the Russian forces admitted for the first time that there were deaths and the capture of a number of its members, it showed attempts to achieve tangible field gains in the face of the fierce resistance of the Ukrainian forces, especially in Kharkiv, after the Russian forces entered Heavy fighting broke out after the Ukrainian soldiers refused to surrender.
And near Kherson, in the south of the country, the Russian Defense Ministry announced the control of Chornopavka airport.
In Lugansk, separatist forces penetrated the Ukrainian lines at a depth of 52 kilometers, and in Donetsk separatist forces took control of four new towns in the center of the city of Volnovakha.
On the ground, the Ukrainian News Agency said that the Ukrainian military forces bombed a convoy of Russian military vehicles near the Makarev region, 60 km from the capital, Kyiv.
The Ukrainian news agency also reported that the number of Russian dead in the ongoing battles has risen to 4,500.
losses
A spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry, Igor Konashenkov, admitted that there had been deaths, injuries and prisoners in the ranks of the Russian forces, but added that the losses of the Ukrainian forces were many times greater.
The Russian Defense Ministry's "Zvezda" channel published pictures it said were of destroyed Ukrainian MiG-29s on the runway of an airport in the city of Ivano-Frankivsk in western Ukraine.
In turn, Ukrainian media reported that two Russian helicopters had been shot down north of Kyiv.
The Ukrainian Defense Industries Company announced that the Russian bombing caused the destruction of the largest cargo plane in the world, the Ukrainian-made "Antonov 225", in a Russian bombing of Gostomel Airport.
In the field developments as well, the Donbass region in eastern Ukraine witnessed violent battles yesterday, and the pro-Russian separatists in the city of Luhansk in the region said that they had begun to change the regulations and laws in the areas they controlled.
The separatists broadcast pictures of what they said was the return of life to normal in the city of Stanica Luganskaya, which they seized two days ago.
The separatists added that they canceled all transactions in the Ukrainian currency "UAH", and adopted dealings in the Russian ruble, and changed all laws and regulations within what they said were "measures to impose the regime of the Luhansk Republic" in the areas recaptured from the Ukrainian army, as they put it.