(Reuters) – Russia unleashed a fresh volley of missiles on Ukraine overnight, killing two people, setting off huge blazes and damaging dozens of homes and other buildings in Pavlohrad, city and railway hub in the east.
FIGHTING
* The White House estimated that Russia’s military has suffered 100,000 casualties in the last five months in fighting against Ukraine in the Bakhmut region, including 20,000 deaths, half from the Wagner mercenary group.
* A Ukrainian general said Russian troops had been pushed out of some parts of the battlefield city of Bakhmut but conditions there were difficult.
* Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin renewed his appeal to Russia’s defence ministry to increase ammunition shipments to his fighters in Bakhmut.
* An explosion derailed a freight train in Russia’s Bryansk region which borders Ukraine, the governor said.
DIPLOMACY
* The Vatican is involved in a peace mission to try to end the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Pope Francis said.
GRAIN
* There is no progress in removing obstacles to Russian grain and fertiliser exports caused by the West’s “sanction strategy”, a senior Russian diplomat in Washington said on Tuesday, ahead of the expiry of a dealsafeuarding Ukrainian grain exports.
* Ukraine’s grain exports totalled 3.62 million tonnes in April compared with 923,000 tonnes in April 2022 when all the country’s Black Sea ports were blocked due to the Russian invasion.
QUOTES
* If the Wagner group is to die, it will be “not at the hands of the Ukrainian army or NATO but because of our domestic bastard-bureaucrats” – Yevgeny Prigozhin.
* “The explosion wave twisted the door. Had we stayed for five more seconds, we would have been trapped here … My child will need psychological help, it is horrible” – Pavlohrad resident Viktoriia Suprun.
* “Russia’s attempt at an offensive in the Donbas largely through Bakhmut has failed” – White House national security spokesperson John Kirby.
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(Compiled by Reuters editors)
