Over 50 Russian Soldiers Wiped Out in 'Fire Attack' on Training Camp: Kyiv

Ukraine's armed forces have touted an operation in which it said dozens of Russian soldiers were killed.

Kyiv said on Friday that three days earlier "an effective fire attack" by Ukrainian forces on a training camp where there was a "concentration of militants" had led to enemy losses of 56 personnel.

The update did not specify the exact location of the purported Russian losses but the statement was preceded by Kyiv saying that Chechen troops had been engaged in looting in the southwestern part of the Donetsk oblast.

The update, from the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, also said that Russia had launched a total of 43 airstrikes and 79 strikes from rocket salvo systems and that "the enemy continues to focus its main efforts on the Lyman, Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Marinka directions."

Meanwhile, the governor of Poltava oblast in central Ukraine, Dmytro Lunin, said on Saturday that Russian forces had launched an airstrike targeting the Myrhorod military airfield, using ballistic and cruise missiles, as well as drones, although the damage was limited.

Ukraine's counteroffensive is reported to have started although Kyiv has not made any official announcement about the widely anticipated push to recapture Russian-held territory.

However, Kyiv has said it has made gains with Serhii Cherevaty, spokesperson for the eastern grouping of Ukraine's armed forces, saying on Saturday that Ukrainian troops had advanced up to nearly a mile in "different sections" although did not specify where exactly.

In televised comments, Cherevaty also said that in the Bakhmut area, 138 Russian soldiers had been killed and 236 wounded over the previous day.

He added that Moscow's forces were trying to counterattack but that they had not been successful and that there were heavy Russian troop casualties and destroyed military hardware. Newsweek has contacted the Russian Defense Ministry for comment.

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said on Friday that Ukrainian forces had made further gains around Bakhmut and in western Donetsk and that counteroffensive operations were ongoing in at least four areas of the front.

The think tank noted that Russian news sources had prematurely claimed that the counteroffensive has already failed, referring to damage sustained by Western-supplied equipment.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the counteroffensive had begin but Ukrainian troops "did not reach their aims in any area of combat."

Separately, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made a surprise visit to Kyiv where he honored fallen Ukrainian soldiers and laid a wreath at a memorial site at St. Michael's Cathedral in the Ukrainian capital.