Ukraine Battles Blaze On Amid U.S. Report Of Kyiv Press Toward Cease-Fire Talks 'By End Of Year'
Russian and Ukrainian forces were battling throughout eastern and southern Ukraine as Kyiv asserted a possible shift in the strategic balance, while a U.S. report hinted at Ukrainian hopes for a possible endgame that could lead to peace talks in the 15-month-old full-scale Russian invasion.
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Ukraine's General Staff said in its early assessment on July 1 that its forces had engaged in around 20 battles against Russian troops the previous day.
It said Ukrainian forces had beat back Russian offensives in areas around Lyman, Bakhmut, Avdiyivka, and Maryinka on June 30.
It also cited heavy aerial attacks from Russian forces in the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk and the southern Zaporizhzhya and Kherson regions.
The Ukrainian General Staff said Russia's "main efforts" in the south were aimed at "preventing the advance of Ukrainian troops."
RFE/RL cannot confirm claims of battlefield developments by either side in areas of heavy fighting.
The Washington Post reported on June 30 that CIA Director William Burns recently visited Ukraine to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and intelligence officials and to hear their "ambitious strategy to retake Russian-occupied territory and open cease-fire negotiations with Moscow by the end of the year."
The previously unreported trip coincides with a widely anticipated counteroffensive that Zelenskiy said has been "slower than hoped" but which Ukrainian officials claim has shifted the "strategic initiative" in the 16-month full-scale Russian invasion.
Malyar said on June 30 that Ukrainian forces were making gains "in all directions."
Kyiv has suggested that it still has not deployed the bulk of Ukraine's Western-trained forces and heavy equipment.
Burns' purported trip came shortly before the abortive mutiny on June 24 by Wagner mercenary group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin and his paid fighters, who have been essential components of Russia's invasion alongside hundreds of thousands of regular troops and conscripts.
Prigozhin and an untold number of those mercenaries have reportedly been offered haven in Belarus, prompting Zelenskiy to buttress Ukraine's defenses along its northern border.
Burns' trip was one of many he has made "regularly" to Ukraine since February 2022, an unnamed source told The Washington Post, in this case to share intelligence and pledge ongoing U.S. commitment to Ukraine's defense efforts.
The Washington Post and other media reported that Burns called Russian intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin after the mutiny to tell Moscow that the United States had no role in it.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov has urged patience and said the “main event” in Kyiv's counteroffensive is still to come.
U.S. Army General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said this week that the Ukrainian counteroffensive is making steady progress, although perhaps not as rapidly as many in the West had anticipated.
On June 28, the United States announced a further $500 million arms package to bolster the Ukrainian counteroffensive.
In an interview published on June 30, Ukraine's top commander Valeriy Zaluzhniy complained that the perceived slow pace of Western weapons supplies "pisses me off." Speaking to The Washington Post, he pressed Kyiv's call for F-16 fighters pledged by its Western allies.
"I do not need 120 planes," Zaluzhniy said in an interview. "I'm not going to threaten the whole world. A very limited number would be enough."
Source: Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty
