Ukraine claims to have ‘liberated’ Andriivka village near Bakhmut; evacuations ordered in Kherson

The Ukrainian armyon Friday (September 15) announced that they have “liberated” the village of Andriivka near the key frontline town of Bakhmut, which was captured by Russia in May. This comes a day after Ukrainian authorities ordered civilians in the Kherson region to evacuate due to regular bombings by Moscow’s army.

Ukrainian troops capture eastern village

The announcement of the recapture of the village of Andriivka was made by the General Staff of Ukraine’s armed forces during his morning report, saying that Russian forces also suffered “significant” casualties and equipment losses.

“In the direction of Bakhmut, the enemy does not stop trying to break through the defence of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the area of Bogdanivka,” said the General Staff, on Facebook.

“In the course of the assault, they liberated Andriivka in Donetsk region, inflicted significant losses on the enemy in terms of manpower and equipment, and entrenched at the occupied frontiers,” it added, while also reporting “partial success” near Klishchiivka village, south of Bakhmut.

Andriivka is around 14 kilometres south of the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, which has seen some of the longest and bloodiest battles during the war.

The announcement also comes a day after Ukraine’s Deputy Defence Minister, Hanna Maliar reported that Andriivka had been brought under Ukrainian control but later backtracked on the saying that the fighting was still raging around the village.

Speaking about the progress on the southern front General Staff spokesman Andriy Kovaliov said its troops were inflicting substantial losses on the enemy near the village of Verbove in the Zaporizhzhia region.

Civilians in Kherson ordered to evacuate

Ukrainian Governor Oleksandr Prokudin took to Telegram, on Thursday (Sep 14) and said, “The Kherson Regional Defence Council has decided to compulsorily evacuate families with children from areas under constant enemy fire.”

The Ukrainian official indicated that Kherson’s regional authorities were preparing for “emergency situations” ahead of winter regarding electricity supplies. Last year, Russia allegedly carried out massive strikes against the war-torn country’s infrastructure which plunged civilians into the cold and dark during sub-zero conditions.

Russian submarine suffered ‘catastrophic damage’ after Ukrainian strike: UK

The United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence, on Friday (September 15) said that a Ukrainian strike on Sevastopol naval base earlier this week inflicted “catastrophic damage” to a Russian submarine and destroyed a landing ship.

According to the British MoD, the Ukrainian attack on Wednesday (September 13) on the Sevmorzavod shipyard hit landing ship Minsk and Kilo 636.3-class submarine Rostov-na-Donu as the vessels were undergoing maintenance in dry docks.

“Despite the Russian Ministry of Defence downplaying the damage to the vessels, open-source evidence indicates the Minsk has almost certainly been functionally destroyed, while the Rostov has likely suffered catastrophic damage,” said the British MoD.

The British defence officials also said that it would take hundreds of millions of dollars and many years to fix the submarine, not to mention the “realistic possibility that the complex task of removing the wreckage from the dry docks will place them out of use for many months.”

(With inputs from agencies)

Disclaimer: A number of claims and counterclaims are being made on Ukraine-Russia war on the ground and online. While WION takes utmost care to accurately and responsibly report ongoing developments, we cannot independently verify the authenticity of all statements, photos and videos.

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