Russia claims Ukrainian 'sabotage group' attacked Belgorod after Dnipro airstrike wounds eight

Russia says it is battling a cross-border incursion in Belgorod by saboteurs who burst through the frontier from Ukraine, but Ukraine's military intelligence service is blaming the armed operation on "opposition-minded Russian citizens" from two paramilitary groups, Ukrainian media outlet Hromadske said.

Belgorod Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said a Ukrainian army "sabotage group" had entered Russian territory in the Graivoron district.

He said the Russian army, border guards, presidential guards and FSB security service were taking measures to repel the raid.

He said at least three people had been injured and three houses and a local administrative building damaged, but described reports of an evacuation as "lies".

"Do not listen to our enemies," he said.

Mr Gladkov said he imposed a "counter-terrorism regime" allowing authorities greater powers to clamp down on people's movement and communications.

In a late-night post on Telegram, Mr Gladkov said houses and administrative buildings were damaged in two attacks in the towns of Borisovka and Graivoron.

Telegram channels monitoring Russia's military activity, including the blog Rybar, with more than a million subscribers, said buildings housing the Interior Ministry and the FSB security service had come under attack in the region's main town, also known as Belgorod.

Hromadske quoted Ukrainian military intelligence spokesperson Andriy Yusov as saying the Freedom of Russia Legion and Russian Volunteer Corps were responsible for the incursion. It did not make clear whether he provided any evidence for the assertion.

"Responsibility for these events was taken by citizens of [Russia], particularly the RDK and the 'Freedom of Russia' Legion," he said, using the acronym for the Russian Volunteer Corps.

"I think we all can only welcome the decisive actions of opposition-minded Russian citizens, who are ready for an armed struggle against the criminal regime of [President] Vladimir Putin."

Mr Yusov said the Belgorod operation would create a "security zone" to protect Ukrainians from cross-border attacks by Russia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin had been informed of the attacks in Belgorod, the RIA news agency cited Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov as saying.

Mr Peskov was cited as saying that Russian forces were working to eject and eliminate the group, RIA reported.

A senior aide to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Kyiv had nothing to do with the fighting.

"Ukraine is watching the events in the Belgorod region of Russia with interest and studying the situation, but it has nothing to do with it," presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak tweeted.

"As you know, tanks are sold at any Russian military store, and underground guerilla groups are composed of Russian citizens."

In a written statement, Mr Podolyak said Ukraine's military operated only on Ukrainian territory, and echoed Ukrainian military intelligence in blaming Russian partisans for the incursion.

At least eight people have been wounded and scores of buildings damaged in a Russian air attack on Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region, but officials say its air defence systems destroyed 20 drones and four cruise missiles.

Video footage released by emergency services showed a huge crater in a courtyard and firefighters dousing the remnants of blazes in huge piles of rubble near bombed-out buildings.

With a Ukrainian counteroffensive looming, Russia has intensified its missile and drone strikes this month after a lull of nearly two months.

Waves of attacks now come several times a week — the heaviest intensity of the war.

"The Russian invaders attacked military and infrastructure facilities of the eastern outpost of Ukraine — the city of Dnipro," Ukraine's air force said.

"The attack was carried out by 16 different types of missiles and 20 Shahed-136/131 strike drones."

Ukraine's air force said air defences brought down 20 Russian drones and four cruise missiles.

At least one man was wounded in the attack on Dnipro city and seven people were injured on an attack on Synelnykivskyi district of the Dnipropetrovsk region, the governor, Serhiy Lysak, said on Telegram.

Scores of buildings, including private homes, apartment blocks and administrative infrastructure were damaged or destroyed, he said.

Reuters was not able to independently verify the reports.

Ukraine's state-owned power generating company Energoatom said on Monday an outage at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant was due to Russian shelling of an external power line.

The Dniprovska power line in Ukraine, which supplies power for the now Moscow-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, was disconnected after overnight Russian shelling, Energoatom said.

The transfer of F-16 jets to Ukraine would raise the question of NATO's role in the conflict, a senior Russian diplomat said.

US President Joe Biden on Friday endorsed training programs for Ukrainian pilots on F-16 fighter jets and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy assured Mr Biden the aircraft would not be used to go into Russian territory.

"There is no infrastructure for the operation of the F-16 in Ukraine and the needed number of pilots and maintenance personnel is not there either," Russia's ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Antonov, said.

President Joe Biden tells allies he is approving plans to train Ukrainian pilots on US-made F-16 fighter jets, as leaders of the world's most powerful democracies work to toughen punishments on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.

"What will happen if the American fighters take off from NATO airfields, controlled by foreign 'volunteers'?"

Mr Antonov said that any Ukrainian strike on the Crimea region would be considered a strike on Russia.

"It is important that the United States be fully aware of the Russian response," Mr Antonov said.

Ukraine has intensified its strikes on Russian-held targets especially on the Crimea Peninsula, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.

Mr Antonov also reiterated a Russian accusation against the United States of subjecting Western countries to its agenda.

"Washington completely subordinated the G7 members to its own policy regarding the conflict in Ukraine," Mr Antonov said, adding the US wanted a "strategic defeat" for Russia.

During their summit on the weekend in Japan, the G7 countries signalled long-term support for Ukraine.

Mr Zelenskyy, who also attended the gathering, said he was confident that Ukraine would receive supplies of the F-16.

Ukraine said its forces north and south of Bakhmut were advancing to entrap Russians inside the ruined city that Moscow says it captured over the weekend after Europe's bloodiest battle for ground troops since World War II.

Russia's proclamation on Saturday that it had finally captured the final few blocks of Bakhmut culminated a battle both sides have called a meat-grinder, and gave Moscow its first chance to declare a substantial victory for more than 10 months.

But even as the Russians pushed forward inside Bakhmut, their forces on the city's northern and southern outskirts were retreating at the war's fastest pace for six months, giving both sides reasons to claim momentum had now shifted their way.

Moscow says capturing Bakhmut now opens the way to further advances in eastern Ukraine.

Ukraine says its advance on the Russian forces' flanks was more meaningful than its withdrawal inside the city, and Russian reinforcements sent to hold Bakhmut will weaken Moscow's lines elsewhere.

"Through our movement on the flanks — to the north and south — we manage to destroy the enemy," Ukrainian Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar said on Monday in televised comments.

"By moving along the flanks and occupying certain heights there, our armed forces have made it very difficult for the enemy to stay in the city itself."

Reuters could not independently verify the situation.

Ms Maliar also said Ukraine still held a foothold inside the city itself, although independent monitors said any remaining Ukrainian presence there was s unlikely to be substantial.

"Wagner Group mercenaries likely secured the western administrative borders of Bakhmut City while Ukrainian forces are continuing to prioritise counterattacks on Bakhmut's outskirts," the Institute for the Study of War think tank said on Monday.

The battle inside Bakhmut so far has been led by Wagner, a private Russian army whose leader Yevgeny Prigozhin has been issuing daily audio and video messages mocking the leadership of Russia's regular armed forces and accusing them of abandoning their flanks even as his own forces advanced.

In his latest message on Monday, he repeated a vow to pull his troops out of Bakhmut, beginning in three days, and hand over the defence of the newly captured city to regular troops.

"On the western edges, defensive positions have been set up, and so Wagner will be leaving Artyomovsk between May 25 and June 1," he said, using the Soviet-era name for Bakhmut.

"If the Defence Ministry's own forces aren't enough, then we have thousands of generals — we just need to put together a battalion of generals, give them all guns, and it'll all be fine."

Moscow's defence ministry has acknowledged that some Russian troops fell back outside Bakhmut last week, but has denied Mr Prigozhin's repeated assertion that the flanks were crumbling, or that the military had withheld ammunition from Wagner.

The warring sides hold opposing views of the importance of the battle over Bakhmut, once a small mining city of 70,000 people but now an uninhabited ruin laid to waste by eight months of street-to-street combat and bombardment.

Reuters/ABC