According to Ukrainian sources, the maternity ward of a hospital in the Zaporizhia region was hit during Russia’s night rocket attacks. A suspected Ukrainian attack on oil depots near the Russian port of Novorossiysk shows the vulnerability of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. All news about the Ukraine war in the ticker.
Wednesday, November 23, 8:07 a.m .: According to Ukrainian information, the maternity ward of a hospital was hit during Russia’s night rocket attacks in the Zaporizhia region. “Pain floods our hearts – an infant who was just born was killed,” Zaporizhia’s military governor Olexandr Starukh wrote on his Telegram channel on Wednesday. Rescue workers are on duty in the small town of Vilnjansk, the site of the rocket impact.
There were also rocket hits in the neighboring regions of Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk. In Donetsk, where Russian troops have been attacking more and more for weeks, Ukrainian authorities said one person was killed and eight injured. There were no casualties in the Dnipropetrovsk region. However, more than 30 projectiles hit towns, said military governor Valentyn Resnichenko.
Since Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine began nine months ago, the United Nations (UN) has registered more than 6,500 civilian deaths, including more than 400 children. However, the actual number of civilians killed is significantly higher, according to both the UN and Kiev estimates.
8:07 p.m .: The Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea, annexed by Russia, was attacked with drones on Tuesday, according to local authorities deployed by Moscow. Two of the unmanned aerial vehicles had “already been shot down,” said the governor of the Sevastopol region, Mikhail Rasvoyaev, in the online service Telegram. He emphasized that civilian infrastructure had not been hit and called on the population to remain calm.
The Russian Black Sea Fleet is stationed in Sevastopol, the largest city in Crimea. After an attack on the port at the end of October, Moscow temporarily suspended the grain agreement with Ukraine.
Tuesday, November 22, 8:42 a.m.: According to British assessments, a suspected Ukrainian attack on oil depots near the Russian port of Novorossiysk shows the vulnerability of the Russian Black Sea fleet. The British Ministry of Defense in its daily intelligence update on Tuesday referred to Russian and Ukrainian media reports that there was an attack on November 18 at an oil terminal near the Russian naval base.
“Not all details of this incident are known yet,” the ministry stressed. However, any demonstration that Ukraine has the ability to threaten Novorossiysk would pose another strategic challenge for the Black Sea Fleet. It would also further undermine Russia’s already reduced maritime influence in the Black Sea.
Media had reported that a Ukrainian drone had probably attacked a terminal of the oil company Transneft on the night of November 18. The company denied the reports.
After Ukraine attacked the Russian base of Sevastopol on the annexed peninsula of Crimea, the Russian Navy moved several submarines to Novorossiysk. The fact that this port is now also accessible to the Ukrainians is also a threat to Russian landing ships stationed there, it was said in London. These ships have taken on a more important role in supplying Russian forces in Ukraine since the Kerch Bridge was damaged in October.
8:24 p.m .: According to Kiev, Ukrainian and Russian troops continue to fight fiercely in the Donbass industrial area in eastern Ukraine. Russia is concentrating its attacks on the cities of Avdiivka and Bakhmut in the Donetsk region, the Ukrainian general staff said on Monday evening. Elsewhere, the general staff spoke of an “active defense” of the Russian troops – that’s where the Ukrainians are apparently attacking. The places Kupjansk and Lyman as well as Novopavliwka and the front in the Zaporizhia region were named. The Russian troops fought back with tanks, mortars, pipe and rocket artillery.
The information provided by the Ukrainian military was initially not independently verifiable. According to the official report, Russian troops in southern Ukraine are strengthening their defense lines on the southern bank of the Dnipro River. According to unofficial information, the Ukrainian artillery fired on this area in the direction of Crimea with their long-range artillery. Russian military bloggers reported on a successful Russian advance on the town of Marjinka near Donetsk.
3:42 p.m .: After the Russian-occupied Ukrainian nuclear power plant Zaporizhia was shelled, experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) examined the plant for damage, according to information from Moscow. This was announced by the adviser to the Russian nuclear power plant operator Rosenergoatom, Renat Karchaa, according to the state news agency Tass. The experts could have visited all objects of interest to them. The IAEA initially gave no information about the inspection.
Earlier, Karchaa said inspectors would only be given access to areas related to nuclear safety. Only that is covered by their mandate. If the experts want to inspect other areas, they will be refused.
The largest nuclear power plant in Europe was shaken by dozens of shells on Saturday and Sunday. The facility had come under fire several times in the previous months. Ukraine and Russia blame each other for this.
The Russian nuclear company Rosatom said there was a risk of a nuclear accident due to the shelling. He was in contact with the IAEA all night, said Rosatom Director General Alexei Lichatschow at an international nuclear energy forum in Sochi, southern Russia, according to the Interfax agency.
Sunday, November 20, 10:01 a.m.: According to the Ukrainian General Staff, the Russian armed forces are relocating units withdrawn from the Cherson region to the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern Ukraine. In Luhansk, the Russian occupiers set up additional checkpoints to identify and arrest deserters, the Ukrainian general staff said on Sunday.
The Russian army is attacking massively with rockets, but it is probably still too early to speak of a new major offensive, said the spokesman for the Ukrainian air force, Yuri Ihnat, according to the Internet portal “Ukrajinska Pravda” on Ukrainian television. But there are heavy fighting in the Donbass in eastern Ukraine.
According to the General Staff, Ukrainian units have been able to fend off numerous Russian attacks in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions since Saturday. The Ukrainian military counted around 60 Russian rocket launcher attacks. The information could not be independently verified.
7:31 p.m .: According to the Ukrainian General Staff, the Russian armed forces are increasing their troop presence in the Luhansk region. In order to accommodate the many soldiers, part of the civilian population will be forcibly resettled, the general staff in Kyiv said on Saturday. The people would be housed in other places, it said. The eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk borders with Russia.
Meanwhile, Russian and Ukrainian troops continued fighting in a variety of hotspots. Tanks, pipe and rocket artillery and grenade launchers were used, it said. According to the Ukrainian military, up to 60 Russian soldiers were killed or wounded in the Mykhailovka region in the Zaporizhia region alone. The information could not be independently verified.
Saturday, November 19, 7:59 a.m.: Due to a planning error, German howitzers are currently not operational in Ukraine. This is reported by the “Spiegel”. 14 Panzerhaubitzen 2000 are in service in Ukraine. According to the report, however, Christine Lambrecht’s (SPD) Ministry of Defense failed to provide sufficient repair facilities. A “majority” of the howitzers are now in need of repair and cannot be used.
5:01 p.m .: Russian rocket attacks have apparently damaged the Ukrainian power grid even more than previously known. “Almost half of our energy system has failed,” Prime Minister Denys Schmyhal said on Friday, according to the Unian news agency. Ukraine therefore needs additional support from the European Union in the field of energy and also financially. Schmyhal made the comments at a joint press conference with EU Commission Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis in Kyiv.
12:08 p.m .: After the withdrawal of Russian troops from parts of the Ukrainian region of Cherson, Moscow is expanding its defenses on the adjacent Crimean peninsula. The fortification work is intended to “guarantee the safety of Crimean residents,” said Moscow’s head of administration for the Ukrainian peninsula annexed in 2014, Sergei Aksjonov, on Friday. However, the security of Crimea must be ensured “mainly through measures on the territory” of the Kherson region.
Last week, Russian troops withdrew from parts of the Kherson region after failing to stop a Ukrainian counter-offensive. The withdrawal allowed Ukrainian forces to position their missiles closer to Crimea.
Friday, November 18, 12:06 p.m .: In the Donbass coal and steel region in eastern Ukraine, Ukrainian and Russian troops are fighting fiercely, with the front line hardly changing at the moment. The Ukrainian General Staff on Friday reported artillery and tank shelling on villages such as Vodyane, Krasnohorivka and Marjinka near the town of Avdiivka. The Kiev information was not independently verifiable, but in this case it was consistent with reports from Russian military bloggers.
Ukrainian-controlled Avdiivka is a few kilometers north of Donetsk. Because the front between Ukrainian forces and Moscow-controlled separatists has been running there since 2014, Ukraine’s positions are well developed. In the nearly nine months since the Russian invasion on February 24, Russian forces have made little gains in terrain. According to Russian data, the village of Opytne was conquered last.
According to estimates by the US Institute for War Studies (ISW), Russia has transferred troops to this sector of the front that have become free as a result of the withdrawal from the Kherson region.
According to the situation report of the Ukrainian general staff, another focus of the fighting is the region around the city of Bakhmut. There, Ukrainian positions were fired on with tanks, mortars, tube and rocket artillery. Here, too, the course of the front has remained practically unchanged for months.
There was also heavy artillery fire on the Kupyansk front. This important railway junction in the Kharkiv region was recaptured in September’s rapid advance by the Ukrainian army. Since then, however, the Ukrainians have made little progress towards the east.
According to local authorities, Russian troops fired at a village in the Zaporizhia region at night with the S-300 system missiles, which were actually intended for anti-aircraft defense. A building was destroyed but no one was injured.
You can read more reports on the Ukraine conflict on the following pages.
