Ukraine War – Voices and Developments: Zelenskyj announces “strong reaction” after deadly rocket attack on Lviv.

After a deadly rocket attack on Lviv, Zelenskyi announces a “tangible response”. The Ukrainian leadership explains the sluggish progress of the counter-offensive. A former general in the Bundeswehr considers Kiev’s war goal “no longer achievable”. All the latest news about the war against Ukraine in the ticker.

Four dead in rocket attack on Lviv – Zelenskyy announces “strong response”.

Thursday, July 6, 7:25 a.m.: According to the Interior Ministry, four people were killed in a rocket attack on a residential area in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on Thursday night. At least nine people were injured, the ministry said on Telegram. A search and rescue operation is underway. According to the information, more than 60 people were evacuated from the destroyed houses. Seven people were rescued from the rubble.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced that there would be “definitely a response to the enemy.” “A noticeable one,” he wrote on Telegram. Videos show badly damaged and in some cases almost completely destroyed residential buildings on an entire street. Zelenskyj wrote: “Consequences of the night attack by Russian terrorists.”

Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovyi spoke of the worst attack on Lviv’s civilian infrastructure since Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine began more than 16 months ago. More than 50 houses were destroyed.

Many refugees from the embattled areas in eastern Ukraine are also staying in Lviv. Until June, the city in the west of the country had been relatively quiet for a long time. But then she became the target of air raids again. Ukraine launched a counteroffensive in early June.

According to the mayor in June, Lviv has taken in around 150,000 people from other parts of the country since the Russian invasion began. The city, which originally had 720,000 inhabitants, is around 70 kilometers east of the Polish border.

British Embassy in Moscow recommends leaving Russia

9:41 p.m.: The British Embassy in Moscow has asked its own citizens to leave Russia. “The invasion (in Ukraine) means that the situation here in Russia is unpredictable,” Ambassador Deborah Bronnert said in a video message published on the diplomatic mission’s Telegram channel on Wednesday evening. If staying in Russia is not mandatory, she advises leaving the country.

Relations between Russia and the West are very strained against the background of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine. Earlier this year, Russian intelligence arrested Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich on alleged espionage charges. Shortly after the outbreak of war, the US government had asked its own citizens to leave Russia. The federal government, on the other hand, has so far only advised against traveling to the country with the largest area.

Bronnert’s appeal came just under two weeks after the unsuccessful revolt by Wagner’s Russian private army. The mercenaries, who had long fought alongside Moscow in Ukraine, had occupied the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and marched towards Moscow, shooting down several helicopters and a plane in the process. Only after hundreds of kilometers did mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, a former confidante of Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin, give the order to withdraw. In return, the insurgent mercenaries received amnesty from the Kremlin. According to experts, the revolt shows how unstable the situation in Russia is.

Military Expert Says Ukraine’s War Aim “Frankly Unattainable”

7:50 a.m.: The former Brigadier General of the Bundeswehr, Wolfgang Richter, said in an interview with the ZDF talked about the current counter-offensive by Ukraine. “The difficulties are now on the Ukrainian side,” Richter said. “The Russians have barricaded themselves very heavily with minefields, with very powerful artillery, tanks and anti-tank forces. They no longer repeated the mistakes they made in the first months of the war.”

Richter analyses: “The Ukrainians have so far deployed a third of their strategic reserve, i.e. with Western weapons. They’re holding the others back, probably hoping to throw another big punch that will lead to a breakthrough.”

He doesn’t think Ukraine’s long-term goal of expelling Russian troops from Crimea and eastern Ukraine is realistic. “The goal of establishing territorial integrity as a whole, a goal that President Zelenskyj has also stated, is frankly no longer achievable,” Richter told ZDF. Unless it comes to his so-called “Black Swan” moment: “Except what happened again and again in history would happen, i.e. a development that is unforeseeable and unpredictable because suddenly something completely different happened , for example domestic political destabilization.”

Dozens wounded in attack on eastern Ukrainian city of Makiivka

Wednesday, July 5, 12:17 a.m.: According to local authorities, 25 people were injured by the impact of several projectiles in the city of Makiivka in eastern Ukraine, which is controlled by Russian troops. Two children were among the injured, said the Moscow-appointed head of the partly Russian-occupied Donetsk region, Denis Puschilin, on his Telegram channel on Wednesday night. “The blast was felt by the majority of the residents of Makiivka and Donetsk.” Previously, Pushilin had reported two deaths from shelling in the Donetsk region.

According to Puschilin, houses, a hospital, schools and a kindergarten were damaged. According to Russian military blogs, Himar artillery rockets, which Ukraine received from the United States, were used for the shelling. According to Ukrainian sources, the force of the explosion is due to the fact that the shelling hit a fuel or ammunition depot. The information provided by the warring parties cannot usually be verified independently.

guide in Kyiv explained sluggish Course the counteroffensive

6:25 p.m.: The Ukrainian leadership has now explained the sluggish progress of the long-heralded counter-offensive against the Russian army with the new goal of a war of attrition. “Task number one is the maximum destruction of personnel, equipment, fuel depots, military vehicles, command points, artillery and anti-aircraft forces of the Russian army,” Secretary of the National Security Council Oleksiy Danilov wrote on Twitter on Tuesday. The more effectively the enemy was destroyed, the more kilometers would be liberated later.

“The past few days have been particularly fruitful,” added Danilov. The spokesman for the Taurian front in southern Ukraine, Valeriy Sherschen, had previously spoken of an advance of a good two kilometers without giving details.

Ukraine has been repelling a Russian invasion for over 16 months. Almost a month ago, the Ukrainian army launched a counter-offensive in the south of the country, which has so far fallen short of its own expectations in terms of recapturing occupied areas.