Donbass combat operations of Russia resume after pause

Russia renewed its combat operations in the eastern Ukraine region of Donbass on Saturday, following a short break to regroup its forces.

In this period, however, reports continued to come in of Russian attacks that came despite the pause.
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu ordered a faster pace of attacks during an inspection of units involved in the invasion of Ukraine.
"After hearing [the situation report], the head of the Russian Defence Ministry has given the necessary instructions to expand the activities of the army groups in all directions of attack in order to deprive the Kyiv regime of the opportunity to continue conducting massive artillery and missile attacks on infrastructure and civilians in the Donbass and other regions," the ministry announced on Saturday.

The general staff in Kyiv said in its situation report that Ukraine has repelled Russian assault attempts in the direction of Bakhmut and near Donetsk in the past 24 hours.
"After regrouping, the enemy has resumed the assault on the Vuhlehirsk thermal power plant, and fighting continues," it also said.
Military experts from the US-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) have also observed that Russian troops are ending the breather they took after capturing the twin cities of Severodonetsk and Lysychansk.
At the moment, the fighting is still small-scale. "If the operational pause is truly over, the Russians will likely continue and expand such assaults in the coming 72 hours," according to the ISW analysis.

Amid the latest scaling up of hostilities, Russia's Defence Ministry confirmed that it was responsible for a missile strike this week on the industrial city of Dnipro.
The Friday attack left three dead and 15 injured. But, whereas Ukraine said the attack struck an occupied street in the industrial city, Russia's Defence Ministry said the attack struck a factory producing replacement parts for ballistic missiles.
Independent confirmation of either claim is impossible.
Russia has been waging war in Ukraine for nearly five months. After initial failures in the north of the country as it targeted the capital Kiev, Russian troops have made gains in the eastern Donbass area through massive artillery deployment.

However, the use of rocket launchers sent from Western allies have allowed the Ukrainian side to inflict some setbacks on the Russians.
To counteract this, the United States believes Russia wants to acquire Iranian combat drones.
The US has information that a Russian delegation visited an Iranian airport for a demonstration of attack-capable drones, a senior US government official said on the sidelines of US President Joe Biden's visit to Saudi Arabia.
Russia has also repeatedly made false claims about alleged successes in its invasion of Ukraine, according to British intelligence experts.
The scope and scale of Russian advances remain limited, the daily intelligence update on the Ukraine war from the Ministry of Defence in London said.
It added the Russian claims a few days ago that they had advanced into the town of Siversk were not true.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky meanwhile has said Russian society will be damaged for decades in the face of the war against his country.
Ukraine will preserve "humanity and civilization," Zelensky said in his video address late Friday. Destroyed educational institutions would also be rebuilt, he promised. "But Russian society, with so many murderers and executioners, will remain crippled for generations - and through its own fault."
However, events on Saturday highlighted how Russia is planning to take as much advantage of its Ukrainian occupation as it can.

The pro-Moscow administration of the south-eastern Ukrainian region of Zaporizhzhya, which is partially occupied by Russian troops, says it is exporting grain on a large scale.
"More than 100 wagons have already been shipped, another contract for 150,000 tons has been signed with a grain trader," Yevhen Balytskyi, the head of the military administration, wrote on his Telegram channel on Saturday.
He did not say where the shipments were headed, but they can only be transported to Crimea or Russia by train. Ukraine has accused Russia of stealing grain for months. Moscow has denied this.
One wagon can transport up to 70 tons of grain, according to the Ukrainian side. According to Balytskyi, Moscow is also planning to ship some 100,000 tons of grain from the southern Ukrainian port of Berdyansk, which Russian forces occupied shortly after invading Ukraine in late February.
Before the war, Ukraine was one of the largest exporters of grain worldwide. According to Kiev, over 20 million tons are stuck in the country due to the Russian invasion and blockades of its sea ports.
G20 finance chiefs meeting in Indonesia agreed on the need to tackle the looming global food crisis brought on by the war, but were divided on how to respond to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Indonesia's finance minister said on Saturday.