June 3, 2023 Russia-Ukraine news

Russian and Ukrainian officials have reported a series of explosions in Russian-occupied cities of the southern Zaporizhzhia region Saturday.  

No casualties were reported by either side following the attacks.

One of the region's Russian-installed leaders, Vladimir Rogov, said Russian air defenses shot down six rockets over Berdiansk, a port city at the southeastern tip of the region. He blamed Ukraine’s military for the attack.

The Russian-installed Berdiansk civil-military administration said even though the missiles were destroyed in the sky, fragments fell near a Catholic church and a bus station, damaging a car. 

The Russian-backed Rogov also reported a series of explosions in Melitopol, west of Berdiansk.

The city's Ukrainian mayor, Ivan Fedorov, commented on the blast in a post on Telegram, but did not immediately imply who was responsible. He is not currently in Melitopol.

Rogov also claimed Ukraine’s Armed Forces were behind a strike on the village of Chernihivka, located between the two large cities hit Saturday.  

CNN is unable to verify claims on battlefield developments.

Saturday's explosions mark the latest in a recent string of attacks on Russian-occupied territories in southern Ukraine.

The head of the Wagner private military company, Yevgeny Prigozhin, claimed in a Telegram post Saturday that unidentified Kremlin factions “are destroying (the) Russian state” and trying to sow discord between him and Chechen leadership and its fighters. 

Prigozhin said a conflict with Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov arose — but has since been settled — because of the Wagner chief's criticism toward Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov.

Prigozhin claimed that he criticizes the defense minister and the chief of the general staff because “they don’t do their job correctly.”

Prigozhin repeatedly berated Russian military leadership during the grinding battle in the eastern city of Bakhmut, accusing top brass of not providing enough ammunition. “They didn’t supply us with shells, and this is the reason why so many of my people got killed,” he said Saturday.

But Prigozhin said he never talked negatively about the Chechen leader or his “Akhmat” detachment. He also said he is not interested in “stirring up ethnic conflicts.” 

On Belgorod: Prigozhin commented on developments in Belgorod, the region that borders Ukraine and has seen recent shelling and cross-border incursions, which he called “a clear attempt to capture that area.” 

He criticized the Russian Defense Ministry over the handling of the incursions, which Moscow blames on Ukraine. Ukrainian officials have insisted that the groups going across the border are anti-Putin Russian nationals acting independently.

"The Ministry of Defense is not in a state to do anything at all as it de-facto doesn't exist — it is in chaos," Prigozhin said. 

“If the Ministry of Defense doesn’t stop what is happening in the Belgorod region soon enough, don’t stop that chaos that is happening around capturing of Russian Federation territory, then we (Wagner units) will certainly come to the Belgorod region and we will protect our people,” Prigozhin said, adding, “we won’t wait on the invitation.”

Russia continues to suffer “significant losses” during fighting around Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, the Commander of Ukraine’s Ground Forces Oleksandr Syrskyi said Saturday after visiting troops on the front line.

Syrskyi's comments came a day after Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the Russian private military company Wagner, said that 99% of his troops had left Bakhmut after handing over their positions to soldiers from the Russian military.

Bakhmut has been the site of one of the bloodiest battles between Russian and Ukrainian forces since the Kremlin launched its invasion last year. Prigozhin claimed victory and control of the city last month, though Ukraine says it continues to have a foothold on the southwestern edge of the city.

Reports suggest that front lines in and around the city have been largely static. In early May, while Wagner forces were pushing westward out from the center of Bakhmut, Ukrainian forces had been making limited territorial gains on higher ground to the northwest and southwest of the city.

The latest from the battlefield: In its daily operational update, Ukraine’s Armed Forces claimed on Saturday that Russia's attempted offensive actions near Ivanivske, a small town around 5 miles west of Bakhmut, were unsuccessful. Kyiv said that Russian forces had carried out air strikes on nearby Bila Hora and Chasiv Yar, as well as a missile strike on the town of Druzhkivka, in the same part of the Donetsk region. 

CNN is unable to verify claims on battlefield developments. 

Russian officials have reported deadly attacks in at least four locations in the Belgorod region and Ukrainian-aligned Russian units are ramping up their incursions, bringing the war to Russian territory.

At least seven people have been killed by shelling in Russian border regions since Friday, according to Belgorod's regional Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov.

Two men and a woman were killed in a barrage of 18 rockets fired on the village of Sobolevka, Gladkov said in a series of posts on his Telegram channel. A gas pipeline and a power line were also damaged in the strike.

Sobolevka, which is located in the Valuisky city district, is the easternmost location to have been struck over the past two weeks. A rail line runs through the village and enters Ukraine in Russian-occupied territory south of the attack, suggesting it may have been targeting Russia’s supply lines.

To the northwest along Russia's border with Ukraine, two women were killed in the village of Maslova Pristan when their car was hit by fire, Gladkov said. Two other women were killed in separate shellings on nearby villages.

Anti-Kremlin Russian fighters: Two units responsible for recent assaults on the border regions – Freedom for Russia Legion and the Russian Volunteer Corps – are made up of Russian soldiers opposed to President Vladimir Putin. Though not officially part of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, they effectively fall under the command of Ukraine’s security forces.

While the cross-border attacks have a military impact, forcing Russia to consider redeploying resources to protect what have been shown to be weak borders, they also appear designed to have an impact on Russian morale.

Legion spokesperson Alexei Baranovksiy appeared on Ukrainian television Saturday and was asked about the aims of the incursions. 

It was not about trying to “die heroically,” he said.

Ukraine is ready to launch its much-anticipated counteroffensive in the war against Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an exclusive video interview with The Wall Street Journal published Saturday. 

“I think that, as of today, we are ready to do it. We would like to have certain things, but we can't wait for it for months,” Zelensky said of the long-awaited military maneuvers.

The president said he believes the counteroffensive will be successful, but he's not sure how long it will take. 

According to the WSJ, Zelensky acknowledged Russia’s superiority in the skies, adding that a lack of protection against Russian air power means “a large number of soldiers will die” during the counteroffensive. 

On NATO: Zelensky also told the newspaper he understood Ukraine would not be able to join NATO while its war against Russia is ongoing, saying, “We do not want to be in NATO during the war. It’s too late now. We should have been there before.”

All NATO allies agree that "Ukraine will become a member of the alliance," NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday ahead of the alliance’s next summit, which is set to take place in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 11 and 12. 

Zelensky, who hopes to secure a pledge at the summit that Ukraine can join NATO after the war, told the WSJ, “If some countries do not see us in NATO and we do not get a signal in Vilnius, I think there is no point for Ukraine to be at this summit.”

Asked if he thought that signal would be given, Zelensky replied, “I don’t know. I’ll be honest with you, I don’t know.”  

Finland's accession to NATO highlights that Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine has been a "strategic failure," according to US Ambassador to Poland Mark Brzezinski.

"What's changed in the last week is that NATO has expanded in a way that just emphasizes the strategic failure of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin's decision to invade Ukraine," he said in an interview with CNN's Michael Smerconish on Saturday.  

His remarks echo those of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who visited Finland on Friday. Blinken also called Russia’s war a "strategic failure," saying it has diminished the country's influence and interests "for years to come."

Finland officially became the 31st NATO member in early April. The Russian invasion drove traditionally non-aligned Finland and Sweden to abandon their neutrality and seek to join the alliance.

When asked if any possible peace negotiations are ongoing, Brzezinski said:

"We're committed to a path of making sure a lasting peace includes a complete reconstruction of Ukraine and a drawing into it — as it wants — into the Western institutional orbit. And that's the opportunity here: to have a renaissance, emerge out of this crime of a war in central and eastern Europe," he said.

Brzezinski also said he believes the majority of US lawmakers remain committed to providing assistance to and showing solidarity with Ukraine. He noted that he's hosted over 150 members of Congress from both parties, including former House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi and current Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

At least two people were killed and six others were injured by shelling in Russia’s Belgorod region Friday, according to the regional governor, marking the latest report of violence spilling over the Ukrainian border into Russian territory.

Belgorod is a common site of the attacks, and local authorities say they have started evacuating residents due to incoming fire. But it is not the only region where officials have reported recent drone attacks or shelling in western Russia.

An overnight Ukrainian drone attack on the Kursk region Friday damaged several buildings, Gov. Roman Starovoyt claimed, while officials in the neighboring Bryansk region reported shelling. In Smolensk — which is located further north, near the border with Belarus — two drones attacked energy and fuel facilities Friday, according to the regional governor.

This all comes after Russian fighters aligned with Ukraine crossed the border into Belgorod last week and seized a checkpoint, sowing confusion and anger in Moscow.

Ukraine's silence: Ukraine has not commented on claims by Russian officials that it has sent any troops, fired artillery or flown drones into its neighbor’s territory.

While Kyiv remains coy, the attacks could be aimed more at destabilizing Russia than seizing any significant tactical advantage, CNN's Sam Kiley writes. Read his full analysis here.

The map below shows some of the key regions that have faced recent attacks:

At least two people were killed and six others were injured in shelling in Russia’s Belgorod region on Friday, said Vyacheslav Gladkov, the regional governor.

The Belgorod region, which is located near the border with Ukraine, has seen intensified violence in the last several days.

Gladkov said in a Telegram post that the people killed were in the yards of their homes during the attack.

Two children hurt by shrapnel were among those hurt, Gladkov said — a 13-year-old boy who fractured his left shoulder and an 11-year-old girl who sustained shrapnel wounds to her left eye.

Ukraine has opened a new front in its battle to drive out the Russian invader — in Russia. But it is oddly coy about admitting that it has sent troops, fired artillery and flown drones into its neighbor’s territory.

The operations of Russian citizens, carrying Ukrainian military ID, wearing Ukrainian uniforms and attacking from Ukraine, remain officially opaque. It is Kyiv’s contribution to what’s become known as “hybrid warfare” in the “gray zone” of contemporary conflict.

The two terms provoked books and a tsunami of excited opinion from an army of pundits when Russia first invaded Ukraine in 2014.

Back then, so-called “Little Green Men” — donned in peculiar two-tone sport-hunting uniforms and Russian military fatigues – appeared in Crimea.

When it was suggested that maybe, just maybe, these men were actually Russian troops, Vladimir Putin quipped, “You can go to a store and buy any kind of uniform."

Moscow’s official line was that the men who raised the Russian flag over Simferopol and stormed Crimea’s local parliament were “self defense units” of pro-Russian Ukrainians anxious to bring their territory under Moscow’s rule.

By the time Moscow admitted that its troops were actually in Ukraine, a large chunk of the former Soviet 14-year-old nation was under Putin’s control.

Now, on a small scale, Ukraine is adapting those same tactics to try to secure strategic effect.

The Russian Volunteer Corps and the Freedom for Russia Legion – which fall under Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence structure – have been conducting short cross-border raids into Russia.

The principal aim? Destabilization.

Read more about Ukraine's destabilization efforts:

RELATED

Ukraine's cross-border tactics are aimed at destabilizing Russia. Judging by the response, they're working | CNN