After the Russians failed to capture Kharkiv, their main target shifted towards eastern Ukraine, with the Pokrovsk front becoming their priority today, said Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
He noted that the response to such developments on the front should be new military aid packages from partners and strengthened air defense systems.
“After the Russians failed to capture Kharkiv, their main target is eastern Ukraine. They are concentrating on Sloviansk, particularly. Today, Pokrovsk is also their priority. Of course, Kostyantynivka and Toretsk are among their targets as well, and they have plans for Sloviansk, but those are just plans. They are concentrating the most weapons and guided bombs on the Pokrovsk front,” said Zelenskyy.
The Ukrainian president urged the allies to aid Ukraine in preventing the occupying forces from seizing more of the country’s territories.
“We must prevent their planes from hitting us. Although to be honest, they have already lost a significant number of aircraft and are losing their air defense. It’s difficult to fight them in the sky. It is a fact that their fleet is more numerous, but still…” Zelenskyy remarked.
On 1 August, Russia attacked Ukraine with an unspecified number of Iskander-M ballistic missiles and seven Shahed-136/131 strike drones, said Mykola Oleshchuk, Commander of Ukraine’s Air Force, on Telegram.
Oleshchuk reported that the missiles were launched from Russia’s Voronezh Oblast and occupied Crimea, while the drones were launched from Cape Chauda in Crimea and Russia’s Kursk Oblast. Ukrainian air defense forces successfully detected and tracked seven Shahed drones, all of which were shot down over the Kyiv, Poltava, Kherson, and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts.