Russian forces advance deeper into Ukraine’s Sumy region

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By Guy Faulconbridge and Lidia Kelly

MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russian forces on Wednesday advanced further into Ukraine’s northern region of Sumy, threatening the regional capital after taking more than 150 square km (58 sq miles) of the area in less than two weeks, according to Russian officials and Ukrainian open source mapping.

Despite the relaunch of peace talks, the war has been heating up and Russian forces, which already control just under a fifth of Ukraine, advanced in May at their fastest pace for at least six months, according to Ukraine’s authoritative Deep State online map project.

Russia in April said it had ejected Ukrainian forces from the western Russian region of Kursk, and President Vladimir Putin has ordered his forces to follow up by carving out a “buffer zone” in the adjoining Sumy region of Ukraine.

Russia’s defence ministry said its troops had taken the settlement of Kindrativka and were now 25-30 km (15-20 miles) from the city of Sumy, which is now within artillery and drone range.

“The Russian Armed Forces continue their successful offensive north of Sumy,” said Yuri Podolyaka, one of the most influential pro-Russian military bloggers.

The Ukrainian Deep State map of the battlefield showed Russia with control over 154.4 square km (60 square miles) of Sumy region and attacking it from different directions.

Andriy Demchenko, a spokesman for Ukraine’s State Border Guard Service, said that Russia was using small assault groups -rather than armoured vehicles – to penetrate into Sumy, Interfax Ukraine reported.

Kyiv said a Russian artillery attack on the city of Sumy killed four people and injured 28.

Military analysts say the Russian advance, with fierce frontline fighting and missile and drone strikes in Sumy, stretches Ukraine’s ability to simultaneously defend its southern Donbas region, of which Moscow is seeking full control.

But while defending its own territory, Ukraine has repeatedly shown that it is still capable of inflicting painful blows inside Russia. Within the past few days, it has attacked Russian strategic bomber planes at their bases and the Crimean Bridge and, Moscow says, blown up a highway bridge over a train. Ukraine has not commented on the latter attack, in which Russia says seven civilians were killed.

(Writing by Lidia Kelly in Melbourne and Guy Faulconbridge in Moscow, and Reuters in Kyiv; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)