Russian Troops Hit Several Towns In Donetsk Region And Southern Ukraine With Heavy Fire

JAKARTA - Ukrainian troops reported heavy Russian shelling and attempts to advance into several towns in the eastern region of Donetsk, which has been the main focus of nearly six months of war, though said they were also repelling many attacks.

The General Staff of the Ukrainian armed forces also reported Russian shelling of more than a dozen towns on the southern front, particularly the Kherson region, which is largely controlled by Russian forces, although Ukrainian forces continue to seize territory.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine had repeatedly proposed different formats to the Russian leadership for peace talks, with no progress.

"So we have to defend ourselves, we have to respond to every form of terror, every shooting incident that doesn't stop for a day," he said in a video speech on Sunday night.

Kyiv has said for weeks they were planning a counter-offensive to retake Zaporizhzhia and the neighboring province of Kherson, the largest part of the territory that Russia seized after the February 24 invasion and is still holding out.

Ukraine's military command said early Sunday that Russian troops had continued to fail to attack Ukrainian positions near Avdiivka, which since 2014, has been one of the outposts of Ukrainian forces near Donetsk.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian military expert Oleg Zhdanov said the situation was very difficult in Avdiivka and nearby towns, such as Pisky.

"We have insufficient artillery force, and our troops are asking for more support to defend Pisky," he said in a video posted online. "But the city is basically under Ukrainian control."

In the Russian-occupied neighboring Lugansk, on the ground beneath a charred abandoned apartment block, Lilia Ai-Talatini, 48, watched as her mother's body was exhumed from a makeshift grave to be taken to a cemetery for a proper burial.

Ai-Talatini said it took him 10 days to reach his parents' apartment, which is on the Russian side of the city of Rubizhne, during heavy fighting there in March.

"My mother is dying, her hands are blue, her skin is pale, there are circles under her eyes. The next day mother died," he explained softly.

An official of the People's Republic of Lugansk, the state founded by pro-Moscow separatists, said a team had been working in Rubizhne for 10 days and exhumed 104 bodies.

"It is clear that shrapnel wounds predominate, but there are also gunshot wounds," explains Anna Soroka, estimating there are 500 unofficial graves in the city. Reuters was unable to independently verify battlefield accounts.