Russia intensifies airstrikes as their army continue advancing in several fronts in Eastern region

Russia said Sunday its forces were making advances in eastern Ukraine, as Kiev reported heavy air strikes on its territory and called on Western allies to allow it to carry out more preemptive strikes on airports or military sites inside Russian territory.

Moscow has intensified its air strikes in recent weeks as it tries to repel a major Ukrainian offensive in the Kursk region.

Since August 6, Kyiv has been launching an offensive in this area, located opposite the Sumy region in eastern Ukraine, with the aim of creating a buffer zone to protect its civilians in the border areas from Russian air strikes.

“Tonight… the enemy launched an air strike on the city of Sumy… Two people were killed and four others, including two children, were injured,” the region’s military administration said on Telegram on Sunday.

Further south, the regional prosecutor’s office said Sunday that a Russian missile attack on a town in the Donetsk region, the epicenter of the fighting, also killed two women.

On the other hand, Kiev forces continue their offensive in Kursk, which they say aims to force Russia to retreat in the east.

Russia is announcing that its forces have made progress in the east, where it is intensifying its attacks. Moscow announced in August that it had achieved the most significant field gains in nearly two years in this region, where the Russian army confirmed on Sunday that it had taken control of another town during its advance towards the strategic city of Pokrovsk.

The Russian Defense Ministry said its forces had liberated the town of Novohrodiivka in the Donetsk region, referring to its capture.

This town is located about twenty kilometers from Pokrovsk, which is considered an important logistics center for the Ukrainian army.

For several weeks, Pokrovsk has been a target for Russian forces, which outnumber and outgun Ukrainian forces.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday stressed the priority of taking control of the entire Donbas region, a major industrial area in eastern Ukraine that includes Donetsk.

For his part, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky urged his country’s partners on Sunday to give it more freedom to use weapons supplied by Western countries to strike targets in Russia.

Kiev is demanding that restrictions be lifted to allow it to launch strikes against military targets it considers legitimate deep inside Russian territory, such as air bases from which aircraft bombing Ukraine take off.

“In just one week, Russia has used more than 800 guided bombs, about 300 Shahid drones and more than 60 missiles of various types against our people,” Zelensky said on Facebook.

“Terrorism can only be effectively stopped in one way: by striking Russian military airports, their Russian bases, and the logistics of Russian terrorism,” he added.

“A state that defends itself against aggression in accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter cannot be limited in its defense,” Ukraine’s new Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga wrote on X.

He added, “international law allows Ukraine to strike legitimate military targets on Russian territory”.

In contrast, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced on Sunday that the time has come to intensify diplomatic efforts to bring peace to Ukraine more quickly and end the two-and-a-half-year war between Moscow and Kiev.

“I think it’s time now to look for ways to get out of the war situation and establish peace more quickly,” said Scholz, whose country is one of Ukraine’s most prominent supporters.

He added in an interview with the German public broadcaster ZDF that Russia should attend the next peace summit.

Russia has rejected any negotiations based on a Ukrainian plan calling for the withdrawal of Russian forces from internationally recognized Ukrainian territory.

In a related development, the death toll from the Russian airstrike on the central Ukrainian town of Poltava on September 3 has risen to 58 after three people were killed and wounded, regional authorities said Sunday.

Russian strikes last week also killed seven people in Lviv, a city in western Ukraine close to the border with EU and NATO member Poland.

In Latvia, a Russian military drone crashed on Sunday.

The president of this small Baltic state, a member of both the European Union and NATO, Edgars Rinkevics, confirmed that this type of incident is increasing along NATO’s eastern borders.