Six people have been killed in Russian attacks on Ukraine in the past 24 hours, according to local officials Sunday.
Two people were killed and three more injured in the Kherson area after more than 100 shells bombarded the region over the weekend, local Governor Oleksandr Prokudin wrote on social media.
Two guided bombs later hit key infrastructure in Kherson city, sparking a partial blackout and disruption to the area’s water supply, reported the head of the city’s military administration, Roman Mrochko.
Local officials said two more people had died in the Donetsk area and that a 57-year-old man and a 54-year-old woman had been killed by an airstrike that destroyed their home in the Kharkiv region.
Ukraine launched 27 drones in an overnight attack on western Russia, the Russian defense ministry announced, Sunday.
Officials said that 18 drones were shot down over the Kursk region, while, they said, two more drones had been shot down over Russia’s Belgorod region. They did not detail the fate of the remaining seven drones.
Ukrainian media outlets later said that Kyiv’s forces had carried out a successful strike on Russia’s Krasnaya Yaruga electrical substation, close to the Ukrainian border.
The reports could not independently verified.
Fierce clashes continued across eastern Ukraine over the weekend, as Russian forces repeatedly tried to encircle the city of Kupiansk in the Kharkiv region, military officials said.
Illia Yevlash, spokesperson for the Ukrainian military’s eastern forces, told journalists that Ukrainian forces in the area had faced 10 separate attacks in the space of 24 hours.
“The enemy is trying to attack us in the direction of Kupiansk to encircle it and reach the banks of the Oskol River,” Yevlash told Ukrainian television. He said that Ukrainian forces in the town of Lyman in the Donetsk region had also faced heavy attack.
Russian offensive
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Sunday that Russian forces are conducting an “active defense” and are improving their position “along the entire length of the [line of] contact” with Ukrainian forces, calling it “an active defense.”
"And our troops are improving their position at almost the entire area. Quite a large area,” Putin said in a video posted to social media by a Kremlin journalist.
Russian forces continue to attack Ukrainian positions around the town of Avdiivka in the eastern Donetsk region in Moscow's largest offensive in months.
The General Staff of Ukraine's military said on October 15 its forces had repelled 15 Russian attacks near Avdiivka as well as in Tonenke and Pervomaiske in the Donetsk region.
"The adversary keeps trying to break through Ukrainian defenses, to no success," it said on Facebook.
US military aid
The administration of U.S. President Joe Biden hopes to push through Congress a new weapons package putting together aid for Israel and Ukraine that will be significantly higher than $2 billion. In an interview on CBS's "Face the Nation” show, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Sunday that the president will conduct extensive talks with Congress this week on the need for the package to be approved.
Biden has been considering a budget request lumping together aid for Israel, Ukraine possibly Taiwan, and the U.S. southern border to improve the chances of getting it approved amid calls from some Republicans to cut money for Kyiv.
Asked whether the request would be for $2 billion, as has been previously reported, Sullivan said, "Well, the number is going to be significantly higher than that, but it will, as I said, certainly include the necessary military equipment to defend freedom, sovereignty and territorial integrity in Ukraine, and to help Israel defend itself as it fights its terrorist threat."
It is not clear how any bill would move through Congress without a speaker of the House of Representatives.
Republicans are struggling to pick a speaker after party hardliners ousted Kevin McCarthy nearly two weeks ago. Members must elect a new speaker before they conduct any legislative work.
Rail logistics
Rail logistics remain “a vital component” in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the British defense ministry said Sunday in its daily intelligence update, adding that Russia uses its rail system for transportation of ammunition, armor, fuel and personnel into the country.
At the same time, it said, rail facilities in occupied parts of Ukraine are vulnerable to Ukrainian artillery, missiles and sabotage. The ministry said Russia “almost certainly” continues to maintain and improve its rail lines of communication.
In addition, the new railway line to Mariupol that Russia is building will shorten delivery time for supplies to the Zaporizhzhia front, according to the ministry’s update.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
