Russia Ukraine war latest: Drone footage shows car ‘filled with explosives’ on Kakhova dam

Ukraine said on Monday its forces had recaptured Piatykhatky, a village on the road to one of the most heavily defended areas of the Russian-occupied south, and that they had retaken 113 square km (44 square miles) of land in the last two weeks.

Ukrainian soldiers held up yellow-and-blue national flags in a video circulated on social media, in which they said they were inside Piatykhatky, the eighth southeastern village that Kyiv says it has liberated.

“Today, June 18, the forces of 128 assault brigade chased out the Russians from the village of Piatykhatky. The Russians ran away leaving equipment and ammunition. Glory to Ukraine!” an unidentified soldier said.

A Russian-installed official in the partially occupied Zaporizhzhia region had said on Sunday that Kyiv’s troops had retaken Piatykhatky, but that they had then been pushed out and that the settlement was now located in a “grey” area of control.

Deputy defence minister Hanna Maliar said Ukrainian forces had not only retaken Piatykhatky but had advanced by up to seven km (4.3 miles) into Russian lines in two weeks.

“In the course of two weeks of offensive operations in the Berdiansk and Melitopol directions, eight settlements were liberated,” Maliar wrote on the Telegram messenger.

Drone footage has emerged allegedly showing a car filled with explosives on the Kakhovka dam when it collapsed earlier in the month.

Two Ukrainian military officials told the Associated Press that Russian troops were in the same area inside the dam where Ukraine claims that the explosion took place.

The Russian Defence Ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

The Russia-controlled Kakhovka dam collapsed earlier this month, causing flooding that has killed at least 52 people.

Ukraine has blamed Russia for the collapse of the dam, with the Ukrainian military claiming it was Russia’s attempt to prevent Ukrainian troops from crossing the Dnipro to attack the occupying forces.

Meanwhile, Russia has blamed Kyiv for sabotaging the dam by cutting off water supplies to Crimea and to distract attention from its alleged faltering counteroffensive.

Russia’s Defence Ministry said on Monday its forces had thwarted a Ukrainian attempt to take the village of Novodonetske in the eastern Donetsk region, one of the areas where Kyiv’s counteroffensive has been focused.

The ministry said in a statement that marines from Russia’s Pacific Fleet had pushed back the overnight attack and destroyed Ukrainian armoured vehicles.

It released a video of what it said was the aftermath of the battle showing what one soldier heard talking in it said was a captured French-made tank.

The reports could not be independently verified.

Deputy defence minister Hanna Maliar said on Monday that Kyiv’s forces had liberated eight settlements in the past two weeks of their offensive operations.

Russia‘s FSB security service said on Monday it had thwarted a series of Ukrainian “sabotage and terrorist plots” targeting Russian-backed officials on Russian-controlled territory in Ukraine and had arrested one woman as part of its investigation.

The FSB said in a statement that the attacks had targeted Russian law enforcement officials and Russian-installed government officials in the southern Zaporizhzhia region, one of four areas in Ukraine that Moscow says it has annexed since the start of what it calls its “special military operation.”

Kyiv is currently mounting a counteroffensive to retake what it and the West say was illegally seized territory. There was no immediate comment from Ukraine on the Russian allegations.

The FSB said it had opened criminal cases against an unnamed woman it described as “an accomplice” on charges related to terrorism and the illegal possession of explosives.

The UK military said both sides are suffering high numbers of military casualties as Ukraine fights to dislodge the Kremlin‘s forces from occupied areas in the early stages of its counter-offensive.

According to British intelligence, the most intense fighting has centred on the southeastern Zaporizhzhia province, around Bakhmut and further west in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk province.

While the update reported that Ukraine was on the offensive in these areas and had “made small advances,” it said that Russian forces were conducting “relatively effective defensive operations” in Ukraine’s south.

The Ukrainian military said in a regular update Sunday morning that over the previous 24 hours, Russia had carried out 43 airstrikes, four missile strikes and 51 attacks from multiple rocket launchers.

Britain’s Ministry of Defence said on Monday that over the last 10 days, Russia has likely started relocating elements of its Dnipro Group of Forces (DGF) from the eastern bank of the Dnipro river to reinforce the Zaporizhzhia and Bakhmut sectors.

The DGF redeployment likely reflects Russia‘s perception that a major Ukrainian attack across the Dnipro river is now less likely following the collapse of Kakhovka Dam and the resulting flooding, the ministry said in an update.

President Volodymyr Zelensky has said Ukrainian troops are advancing in the war and now Russia’s primary focus should now be to prepare its society for the consequences of destroying its own future as Moscow will lose the war.

“Their only concern now should be how to prepare their society, Russian society, to the fact that they will lose everything they are destroying the future of their state for. Russia will lose the occupied territories. There is no and will be no alternative to our steps for de-occupation,” Mr Zelensky said, without referencing to counter-offensive action in the battlefield.

Our troops are advancing, position by position, step by step, we are moving forward, he said.

Russia has rejected an offer from the United Nations to help affected residents in the flooding after the Nova Kakhovka dam breach, officials said.

The UN urged Russia to act in accordance with their obligations under international humanitarian law. “Aid cannot be denied to people who need it,” Denise Brown, UN humanitarian coordinator for Ukraine, said in a statement.

Ukraine accuses Russia of blowing up the Soviet-era dam, under Russian control since early days of its invasion in 2022.

The death toll from flooding in the region has risen to 52, with Russian officials saying 35 people had died in Moscow-controlled areas and Ukraine‘s interior ministry saying 17 had died and 31 were missing. More than 11,000 have been evacuated on both sides.

A team of international legal experts assisting Ukraine‘s prosecutors in their investigation said it was “highly likely” the dam’s collapse was caused by explosives planted by Russians.

Around 32,000 prisoners recruited by Russian mercenary group Wagner have returned to Russia.

These thousands of prisoners have returned to Russia after their contracts with the mercenary group expired, said its chief Yevgeny Prigozhin.

Prigozhin added that the prisoners whose Wagner contracts expired had committed 83 crimes after they returned to Russia. He claimed that this crime rate is less than for other former convicts.