The Ukrainian armed forces have resisted the impression that the Russian side had struck a heavy blow against them.

At the beginning of the week, the Russian Defense Ministry claimed that Russian troops had used rockets to destroy a command post in Ukraine in the Dnipropetrovsk region.

"More than 50 generals and officers" were killed, the spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry said.

The Ukrainian army told the FAZ on Monday that the information did not correspond to the facts.

It is a "false report".

Lorenz Hemicker

Editor in Politics

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However, the Ukrainian side has confirmed further territorial losses in the extreme east of the Donbass front arc.

Near the city of Severodonetsk, which has been heavily contested for weeks, Russian troops have succeeded in taking the village of Metjolkin.

The governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Gaiday, said on Monday on his Telegram channel that the enemy is further strengthening its reserves and is continuously firing on the Azot chemical plant, where hundreds of civilians are said to have sought shelter.

The Russian Ministry of Defense had already reported the capture of the town adjacent to Severodonetsk on Sunday, when the Ukrainian general staff was still talking about a partial Russian success.

The city's mayor reported on 24-hour street fighting on Ukrainian television on Monday.

Experts from the American Institute for War Studies (ISW) assume that the Russian forces in the Severodonetsk area, despite the massing that has taken place and multiple superiorities, are still not sufficient to completely capture the last center of Ukrainian forces in the Luhansk region on the east side of the Seversky Donets River to take

According to the latest assessment of the situation by the ISW, this is due to the fact that apparently undermanned Russian infantry units could hardly capitalize on the clear artillery superiority in urban combat.

Experts from the British secret service blame weaknesses in the Russian air force for Russia's difficulties in advancing in Ukraine.

So far, this dangerous maneuver could have been avoided and not yet able to gain air supremacy, the British Ministry of Defense said in the morning update on Twitter.

This has increased the pressure on the increasingly exhausted Russian ground forces.

London sees the reason for the reticence of Russian fighter pilots in the lack of training for modern war missions.

However, in the four months since the beginning of the war, numerous Russian military aircraft have apparently also been destroyed during the flight maneuvers that have been carried out.

Ukraine put the number of enemy aircraft destroyed on Monday at 216. The information cannot be verified.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy expects Russia to step up its attacks again this week.

According to Zelensky, a "historic week" begins when we hear the answer from the European Union about Ukraine's candidate status.

Because of her, Russia will "demonstratively intensify its hostile actions", targeting not only Ukraine but also other European countries.

The Ukrainian defenders, however, held their ground.