The Ukrainian army has attacked a Russian military base in occupied Melitopol. The operator warns that radioactivity could escape from the nuclear power plant in Zaporizhia. One of the Ukrainian President’s closest military advisers has dared to predict a possible end to the war. You can find all the latest news about the war in Ukraine here in the ticker.
Sunday, August 28, 08:38: Several explosions occurred in the city of Melitopol during the night. This is what the former mayor of the Russian-occupied city reports on Telegram. Accordingly, there were several attacks around one o’clock in the morning. The Ukrainian army attacked a large military base in the city. A building in which one of the pseudo-referendums for the region’s accession to Russia is said to have been prepared was also said to have been destroyed.
1:02 p.m .: Russia and Ukraine have again accused each other of shelling the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant occupied by Moscow’s troops. There is a risk that standards for protection against radioactive radiation would be violated, said the state power plant operator Enerhoatom on Telegram on Saturday. The largest European nuclear power plant was shot at several times by the Russian military within a day. On the other hand, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that the nuclear power plant had been shelled three times by artillery from the Ukrainian side within 24 hours.
Four projectiles hit the roof of a facility that stores nuclear fuel from the US company Westinghouse, said ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov in Moscow. This could not be verified by an independent party. The spokesman also said that other projectiles fell near storage facilities with fuel rods and radioactive waste. However, the radiation situation is still within the normal range.
“Technical personnel are responsible for checking the technical condition of the nuclear power plant and ensuring its operation,” Konashenkov said. He reiterated that Russian forces were guarding the facility but had no heavy weapons nearby. The Russian occupation authorities in the Zaporizhia region had previously spoken again of shelling the nuclear power plant.
9:24 a.m .: According to British findings, the Russian army has recently increased its attacks in eastern Ukraine. In the past five days, the intensity of Russian attacks near the city of Donetsk has increased again, the Ministry of Defense in London said on Saturday, citing intelligence findings. With the attacks, the Russian troops probably wanted to tie up additional Ukrainian troops in the east in order to complicate an expected Ukrainian counter-offensive in the south of the country, it said.
There was heavy fighting near the cities of Siwersk and Bakhmut north of Donetsk. Troops of the Moscow-loyal separatists have probably advanced further into the center of the village of Pisky near the destroyed Donetsk airport, it was said. Overall, however, the Russian units only gained a little ground.
Saturday, August 27th, 8:57 a.m.: Russia is obviously moving heavy equipment towards Crimea. Tanks can be seen on a train in videos said to have been taken at a train station just before the bridge to the peninsula. Crimea, annexed by Russia in 2014, has been the target of Ukrainian attacks for several days. President Selenskyj had repeatedly promised the reconquest.
9:17 p.m .: A Russian collaborator died in an explosion in occupied Berdyansk, in southern Ukraine. As the Russian news agency RIA Novosti reports, the Russian administrative worker Alexander Kolesnikov was killed by an improvised explosive device. Russia accuses Ukraine of carrying out the attack.
8:53 p.m .: Ukraine reports a missile attack on a strategically important bridge in the occupied south of the country, which Russia can no longer use. The Darivsky Bridge in the Cherson region was hit by Ukrainian missiles, the southern military command said. Should the bridge fail, it would severely limit connectivity between parts of Russian-held territory west of the Dnipro River.
6:15 p.m .: One of the Ukrainian President’s closest military advisors has now dared to predict a possible end to the war. “In the worst case it could be in July or in the summer of next year, 2023, and in the best case it could be in January or February, something like that I think,” Oleksy Arestovych told the “Bild” newspaper .
The military adviser assumes that Ukraine will manage to repel the Russians even from Crimea and Donbas. “I think we will continue to weaken their rear line with HIMARS and artillery. And then our infantry will come, our land forces will come and recapture our territory,” said Oleksy Arestovych.
The most important condition for even conducting negotiations with the Russians is that they leave the country. “Only after two or three major defeats by the Russian army, when their negotiating position decreases, can there be talks. Zelenskyy said very clearly that only Ukraine will decide when negotiations will start.”
According to Arestovych, Putin is already defeated. The Russian economy can no longer afford any major mobilization. “We see old tanks and old artillery from the 1960s with the Russians on our front line. All modern weapons come to us.”
11:13 a.m .: According to a secret NATO report on the situation in the Ukraine war, the Ukrainian attacks in Crimea had a positive effect on Ukraine. According to a report dated Aug. 22 obtained by Business Insider, “Russia is likely to disperse its air forces in Crimea to prevent further attacks by Ukraine.”
In fact, the Russian armed forces have already moved ten of their fighter jets from Crimea back to Russian territory to avoid further aircraft losses, according to the NATO report. The planes are six SU-35S fighter jets and four MiG-31BM interceptors. Russia has also increased the number of its tactical surface-to-air missiles in Crimea to counter further attacks by Ukraine, such as drones. “Ukrainian UAVs are difficult for Russian air defense systems to detect as targets,” the NATO report said. “A problem that runs through the entire force that Russia deploys in Ukraine.”
Russia’s illegal attack on Ukraine has been going on for half a year, and the fronts are only slowly shifting. While Russia is trying with all artillery force to conquer larger areas in eastern Ukraine, the Ukrainian armed forces launched a counter-offensive at the beginning of August – not on a broad front, but after the guerrilla warfare practiced by the army, which was outnumbered and outgunned for a long time. Tactics.
10:53 a.m .: After the fires at the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, Ukraine is working to reconnect the plant to the power grid. On Friday morning, the power plant occupied by the Russian army was still cut off from the Ukrainian power grid, as the Ukrainian operating company Energoatom announced on Telegram. However, the damaged connection line, which was responsible for the failure, was “repaired”. Preparations for reconnecting two of the six reactors to the power grid are underway.
According to the operator, the nuclear power plant was completely cut off from the Ukrainian power grid on Thursday as a result of fires. According to Energoatom, however, the nuclear power plant was still supplied with electricity via an adjacent thermal power plant. According to experts, the permanent power supply is crucial for the safety of nuclear power plants.
In recent weeks, the area around the Zaporizhia nuclear power station has been repeatedly shelled, for which Ukraine and Russia have blamed each other. The shelling raised fears that a nuclear disaster similar to that in Ukraine’s Chernobyl in 1986 could occur in Zaporizhia. With six reactors, the plant in Zaporizhia is the largest in Europe.
You can read more reports on the Ukraine conflict on the following pages.
