TOP HEADLINES

• Ukrainian forces have repelled Russian attempts to advance into the center of the small eastern city of Bakhmut, a top Ukrainian general said. READ MORE BELOW

• Russia accused Kyiv of a drone attack on an oil pumping station in the southern Bryansk region on the border with Ukraine, according to the regional governor.

• Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida arrived in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Tuesday and visited the town of Bucha. He is due to meet Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, according to broadcaster NHK.

• Ukraine's defense ministry said an explosion in Dzhankoi in the north of the Crimean peninsula destroyed Russian cruise missiles intended for use by Russia's Black Sea fleet.

• Italy will continue to support Ukraine in resisting Russian attacks regardless of the short-term impact this choice may have on the Italian government's approval rating, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said.

• Russia's defense ministry said a Russian Su-35 fighter jet was scrambled over the Baltic Sea on Monday after two U.S. strategic bombers flew in the direction of the Russian border, but that it returned to base after they moved away.

IN DETAIL

Russian advances in Bakhmut slowed by Ukrainian defense

Ukrainian forces have repelled attempts by the Russian army to advance into the center of the small eastern city of Bakhmut, a top Ukrainian general said on Tuesday.

The months-long battle for Bakhmut has become one of the bloodiest of the 13-month-old conflict in Ukraine.

"Assault groups of the enemy are trying to advance from the outskirts to the center of the city but our defense forces are working and destroying them 24/7," Oleksandr Syrskyi, Commander of Ukrainian Ground Forces, wrote on the Telegram messaging app.

He added that there was intense fighting along the eastern front line. 

Russia has made the capture of Bakhmut a priority in its strategy to take control of Ukraine's Donbas industrial region. If Russian forces capture Bakhmut, it will be Moscow's first significant territorial gain since last summer.

Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar said no one had believed Bakhmut would hold out under such intense attacks for so long.

Naming three generals and two colonels leading Bakhmut's defense, she thanked them for their leadership and thousands of soldiers for their bravery.

"The defense of Bakhmut is holding and the possibilities are not yet exhausted," Malyar said.

The head of Russia's Wagner mercenary group said on Monday that his forces controlled more than half of the embattled eastern Ukraine town.

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