Ukraine announces that it has taken over three localities near Kharkiv

Europe 1 with AFP 3:01 p.m., April 23, 2022, modified at 3:02 p.m., April 23, 2022

Ukraine said on Saturday that it had taken over three localities near Kharkiv, the country's second largest city located in the east and regularly hit by artillery, while the Russian army continues to focus its efforts in Donbass and in the south.

"Our Ukrainian armed forces succeeded in a counter-offensive launched yesterday morning. After long fierce battles, our units dislodged Russian troops from Bezrouki, Slatin and Proudyanka," Kharkiv region governor Oleg Synegoubov said on Telegram.

Among these three villages located north of Kharkiv, Proudïanka, the northernmost, is about fifteen kilometers from the Russian border.

Oleg Synegoubov also said that two people lost their lives and 19 were injured by Russian shelling in the Kharkiv region in the past 24 hours.

Kharkiv still "partially blocked"

According to the spokesman for the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, Kharkiv remains "partially blocked" by Russian forces, particularly present in the northwest and who "reinforce their positions" south of the city.

According to the same source, the Russians continued their offensives in the districts of Izium and Barvinkove to "take control of the rail network".

The Russian army is trying in this area, border between the regions of Kharkiv, Donetsk and Lugansk, to encircle the fortified positions of the Ukrainian army in the Donbass.

In the Donbass, which Moscow has announced it wants to take full control, Russian troops "are concentrating their efforts in the area between Slaviansk-Kramatorsk", a conurbation located in the Donetsk oblast, announced Oleksiy Arestovych, adviser to the Ukrainian presidency.

The Russians are "conducting offensive and reconnaissance operations to try to find weak points in our defense", he said.

Kherson, the only major Ukrainian city controlled by Russia

Further south, also a priority objective for the Russian forces, they "are trying to continue their offensives on the city of Houliaïpole", in the oblast of Zaporozhe, halfway between the eponymous city and the martyred port city of Mariupol.

Between the cities of Mykolaiv and Kherson, close to the Black Sea, "the enemy is trying to improve its tactical positions and consolidate" its control over "the administrative borders of the Kherson region, according to the Ukrainian army.

The city of Kherson, crossed by the Dnieper, is the only administrative capital captured by the Russians during the first days of the invasion.