Ukraine declares alert throughout the country amid warnings of Russian full scale attacks

The Ukrainian authorities announced, on Saturday, a state of air alert throughout the country, warning of a new wave of Russian attacks, while battles rage in the vicinity of the city of Bakhmut, which is besieged by the separatists.

The Ukrainian warning of a new wave of Russian attacks comes after the missile strikes that targeted several Ukrainian cities and regions, and were described as the “widest and most violent” since the start of the war.

The Ukrainian General Staff said that its forces repelled a Russian attack on more than 20 towns in Donetsk Province, and that about 25 other villages in the vicinity of the city of Bakhmut were subjected to heavy Russian bombardment.

And it confirmed that the Russian forces targeted Ukrainian territory with about 163 missiles during the past hours, and that its air defenses shot down many of them.

The Southern Operations Command also said that Russian bombardment continued on infrastructure facilities in Mykolaiv, Odessa, Zaporizhia and Dnipro provinces, resulting in casualties and interruptions in electricity and water supplies.

In Odessa, the Ukrainian authorities said that its air defenses shot down two Russian missiles, which were launched from the Crimea towards areas in the province.

For his part, the leader of the separatists in Donetsk said that his forces, in cooperation with the “Wagner” groups, are close to tightening the siege on the city of Bakhmut, and that the Ukrainian forces are sending large reinforcements towards the city, where battles are intensifying on its outskirts.

Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin, on Friday, held a meeting with the leaders of the participating operations centers in Ukraine, to find out about the course of the battles taking place there.

Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov announced that Putin was briefed on the work of these centers, and held a meeting and separate talks with the leaders, during which he expressed his readiness to listen to their proposals for immediate and medium-term measures regarding the conduct of the military operation in Ukraine.

In the same context, the Russian armed forces had received a new batch of acoustic artillery reconnaissance systems – known as “Penicillin” – which confirmed that they showed high efficiency during the battles.

According to the same sources, Penicillin systems effectively detect the locations of the artillery of the Ukrainian forces, and determine their coordinates, in order to destroy them immediately.

On the other hand, Vitaly Klitschko – Mayor of the Ukrainian capital Kiev – said that the water supply has been restored to all residents of the capital, but half of the city’s population is still deprived of central heating.

He also confirmed that electricity is available in two-thirds of the capital’s regions, and that the emergency energy rationing schedule is still applied, describing the electricity shortage as very large.

On Friday, Kyiv was subjected to a Russian missile attack, which cut off water, electricity and heating from most of its neighborhoods.