Russian forces continue artillery and rocket bombardment from the north to the south of Ukraine
A woman walks past a building damaged by rocket attacks in the eastern Donbas region of Bakhmut, Ukraine, November 1. (Photo: Clodagh Kilcoyne/Reuters)
The Ukrainian military said Russian forces continued to launch artillery and rocket attacks across the front, which stretches from Kharkiv in the north to Zaporozhye in the south. In total, he said, from this Sunday to Monday night, more than 50 settlements were attacked.
In the east: Parts of the Donetsk region were the hardest hit, with Soledar, Vuhledar and Bakhmut districts under fire. Ukrainian forces still hold Bakhmut, but along with settlements to the east and south, it is under daily attack.
The General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces also reported heavy shelling of areas west of the city of Donetsk that have been contested for several months.
He said the Russians were continuing to bomb the recently liberated parts of Kharkiv and Luhansk, where Ukrainian forces are advancing on Russian supply routes. Several settlements in the Kharkiv region near the Russian border were also shelled, he said.
Further south, Ukraine appears to have fired long-range missiles at Russian military headquarters in the town of Volnovakha in the Donetsk region.
Yurii Mysiagin, deputy head of the parliamentary committee on national security, intelligence and defense, said the Akhtamar Hotel on the Mariupol-Donetsk highway, where Chechen forces were stationed, was reportedly hit.
The Russian-backed local authorities in Donetsk confirmed that the building had been destroyed, but did not provide further details.
In the south: As Ukrainian forces try to push into the southern Kherson region, the Russians continue to respond with tank and artillery shelling across a wide area, according to the General Staff. Several settlements in Zaporozhye came under fire, and on Monday evening the town of Mykolaiv was attacked again. Two S-300 rockets hit the town and an apartment building was demolished. The mayor’s office reported the death of a woman.
The General Staff repeated the comments of regional officials that in Kakhovka, on the banks of the Dnieper River, “citizens living in apartments along the banks of the Dnieper were forcibly evicted from their homes.”
He said Russian forces were building fortifications and placing “explosive mine barriers around civilian homes.”
Ukrainian officials said that instead of abandoning the western bank in Kherson, Russian units appeared to be digging in.