Moscow and kyiv targeted in the night by drone attacks – L’Express

⇒ Moscow and kyiv targeted by drone attacks during the night

⇒ The Ukrainian army says it has pushed the Russians back “3 to 8 km” deep near the Dnieper

⇒ For Joe Biden, supporting Ukraine allows the United States to avoid going to war

Kiev and Moscow were targeted overnight from Saturday to Sunday by enemy drone attacks, which were largely intercepted by anti-aircraft defenses and did not cause any casualties, according to the authorities. “An attempt by the Kiev regime to carry out a terrorist attack using a drone against installations on the territory of the Russian Federation has been foiled,” the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement. Ukrainian drone attacks targeting Moscow were particularly frequent in the spring, ahead of and at the start of kyiv’s counter-offensive that began in June, but have become rarer in recent weeks.

The Ukrainian army said this Sunday, November 19, that it had pushed back the Russians “from 3 to 8 km” deep on the left bank of the Dnieper occupied by the Moscow army, the first numerical estimate of the advance of Kiev’s troops in this area after months of disappointing counter-offensive. “Preliminary figures vary from 3 to 8 km, depending on the specifics, geography and topography of the left bank,” army spokesperson Natalia Goumeniouk told Ukrainian television. If this advance is confirmed, it would be the biggest push by the Ukrainian army against the Russians in several months.

In the American newspaper Washington Post, the American president spoke in a column entitled “The United States will not back down from the challenge posed by Putin and Hamas.” The tenant of the White House maintains that “the world has today reached an inflection point”. The President of the United States does not hesitate to compare Vladimir Putin and Hamas: “Putin and Hamas are fighting [chacun] to wipe a democracy off the map. And Putin, like Hamas, hopes to destroy regional stability and profit from disorder.” He adds: “America cannot and will not allow this to happen. For our own national security interests, and for the good of the world.”

More than a hundred Russian doctors on Saturday asked President Vladimir Putin to “immediately” release from prison the artist Alexandra Skotchilenko, sentenced Thursday to seven years in prison and who suffers from health problems, according to her supporters. The artist was convicted by a court in Saint Petersburg, in north-west Russia, for replacing price tags in a supermarket in March 2022 with messages denouncing the assault in Ukraine. In a letter signed by 112 doctors and consulted by AFP, they say they denounce the “obvious injustice” of Alexandra Skotchilenko’s conviction. “The medical community is very concerned about the health of Sasha”, the Russian diminutive of Alexandra, they also write.

Russia has lost 318,570 troops in Ukraine since its large-scale invasion began on February 24, 2022, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces reported in its morning update on November 19.

Russian forces are preparing the third wave of the Avdiivka offensive in Donetsk Oblast, Ukrainian Tavriisk Group of Forces spokesman Oleksandr Shtoupun said on national television on November 18. Russian forces intensified their ground attacks on Avdiivka and surrounding settlements in early October, aiming to encircle the town.

The campaign has been supported by heavy bombings and airstrikes, which continue to cause civilian casualties. “We are waiting for a third wave of offensive, an attempt to encircle Adviivka,” Oleksandr Shtoupun said. Ukrainian forces are holding the defense lines in the Avdiiivka axis while carrying out an offensive in the direction of Melitopol, Oleksandr Tarnavskyi, commander of the Tavria group, reported on November 18. The attacks on Avdiivka, the gateway to occupied Donetsk, cost Moscow dearly.