Russian forces strike arms depot in western Ukraine

Russian forces said they struck an arms depot in the town of Chortkiv in Ukraine's western Ternopil region.

The weapons at the site were US and EU-supplied, according to Russian forces.

Ternopil regional governor Volodymyr Trush said that the strike left 22 people injured. A military installation and four residential buildings were damaged in the strike, according to Trush.

"This strike made no tactical or strategic sense, just like the absolute majority of other Russian strikes. It is terror, just terror," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said of the strike on Chortkiv.

Zelenskyy went on to make a plea for Western countries to supply Ukraine with modern missile defense systems. "These are lives that could have been saved, tragedies that could have been prevented if Ukraine had been listened to."

Russian strikes in western regions of Ukraine are rare compared to the country's east, where fierce fighting rages between Ukrainian and Russian forces.

Russian forces destroy bridge out of Sievierodonetsk — local officials

Russian forces have blown up a bridge linking the eastern city of Sievierodonetsk to neighboring Lysychansk, local officials said.

Lysychansk lies southwest of Sievierodonetsk on the other side of the Siverskyi Donets river. The destruction of the bridge has cut off a possible evacuation route for civilians. Only one of three bridges is still standing.

Sievierdonetsk has become the site of some of the fiercest fighting over Ukraine's eastern Donbas region. Luhansk regional governor said that Ukrainian and Russian forces are still fighting street-by-street in Sievierdonetsk.

"The key tactical goal of the occupiers has not changed: they are pressing in Sievierodonetsk, severe fighting is ongoing there — literally for every meter," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address

Ukraine 'still in control' of Sievierodonetsk steel plant — Defense Ministry advisor

Yuri Sak, an advisor to Ukraine's Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov, told DW that the Ukrainian army remains in control of a steel plant sheltering civilians in Sievierodonetsk.

"The situation in terms of the humanitarian crisis is very, very difficult. But Ukrainian armed forces are still in control of the industrial part of Sievierodonetsk," Sak said.

The Azot plant in Sievierodonetsk is still under Ukrainian control, according to defense ministry advisor Yuri Sak

"Another one of Russia's blitzkrieg has failed because of the resistance and resilience of the Ukrainian armed forces," the advisor said.

"It's a situation of street-to-street fighting. The Ukrainian army is even counter-attacking in some places," Sak said, adding that this could be done more efficiently the faster Ukraine receives heavy weapons.

Ukraine has received NATO-standard 155 mm artillery systems, but needs more, according to Sak.

"The US has said they will provide Ukraine with four systems of HIMARS. The UK said they will be providing Ukraine with MLRS systems… Ukraine currently needs about 100 such systems to be able to conduct a counteroffensive and to be able to liberate our land."

Amnesty accuses Russia of war crimes in Kharkiv

Amnesty International has accused Russia of war crimes in the northeastern Ukrainian city in Kharkiv.

The organization said that attacks in Kharkiv killed hundreds of civilians.

"The repeated bombardments of residential neighbourhoods in Kharkiv are indiscriminate attacks which killed and injured hundreds of civilians, and as such constitute war crimes," the rights group said in a report. "This is true both for the strikes carried out using cluster (munitions) as well as those conducted using other types of unguided rockets and unguided artillery shells."

Amnesty said that it had uncovered proof of the repeated use of 9N210 and 9N235 cluster bombs and scatterable land mines by Russian forces.