Russian troops occupied 80 per cent of Severodonetsk. At the same time, Ukrainian troops launched a series of counterattacks and captured six Russian prisoners. Head of the Luhansk regional military administration Serhiy Hayday said during a televised marathon: “Today, Ukrainian forces attempted counterattacks, and pushed Russians back slightly in some streets. They have captured six prisoners. We’ll see what they have to say.”
Civilians are hiding from Russia’s strikes in bomb shelters under the Azov chemical plant, Hayday told Reuters. “There are civilians there in bomb shelters, there are quite a few of them,” he said.
Authorities fear the plant still has stocks of dangerous chemical materials, Hayday said. The plant is not to become the site of a weeks-long siege similar to the Azovstal steel works in Mariupol. The Azot factory will not be a second Azovstal as that had a huge underground city which isn’t there at Azot, he added.
Ukraine retaking Kherson region. Ukrainian troops liberated more than 20 towns in Kherson region, head of the Kherson regional military administration Hennadiy Lahuta said. “[Ukrainian troops] liberated more than 20 towns on the side of Dnipropetrovsk region. Our brave Armed Forces are gradually moving forward. They will liberate the whole of Kherson region,” he said during a televised marathon. Half of the residents of Kherson region left. Locals stopped rallying as Russians hunt civilians with rubber bullets and throw stun grenades at them, Lahuta said.
Ukraine marks Day for Protection of Children. This year, there’s grim statistics on the International Day for Protection of Children. Up to 250 children were killed, and 420 injured since the invasion. That is preliminary data as the casualty toll in temporarily occupied territories, in Mariupol in particular is unknown. Twenty-two thousand civilians were killed in Mariupol, preliminary reports say. Also nearly 200,000 Ukrainian children from the occupied territories were forcibly taken to Russia.
More than 5.2 million children including three million inside Ukraine and over 2.2 million children in refugee-hosting countries, are now in need of humanitarian assistance, UNICEF said in a statement issued on the Day for Protection of Children.
President’s Envoy on the Rights of Children and Children Rehabilitation Daria Herasymchuk said groups of therapists are being trained to scale up efficient assistance to children in war. More than 20,000 Ukrainian families filed application on a chat bot “Child Is Not Alone” (Dytyna ne sama) to temporarily host the children without parental care in their families. More than 5,000 applications were selected. Ukrainians temporarily host more than 1,400 children.
Ukraine in Flames #83: How war has made Russia toxic for the global community
Russian money, energy, business, diplomacy, sports, art and people are expelled from or protested against anywhere they appear outside Russia. It is a fair treatment for the regime and a society that planned the extermination of Ukrainian people and committed multiple war crimes. Russia can get rid of its toxicity only by stopping the war, changing its international stance and taking full responsibility for the actions of Putin’s regime. Ukraine in Flames #83 explains how Russian influence has become gradually more destructive for the world.
Speakers:
Bektour Iskender, co-founder of Kloop Media
Oleksandr Mishyn, co-founder of the Center for African Studies
