Russian forces continue to retreat in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. The Kremlin-aligned channel Rybar, on Telegram, said on October 7 that Moscow’s forces were losing villages south of Lyman, a town they have tried to capture as a springboard to mount a full-scale offensive on the “fortress belt” cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk. A Ukrainian counteroffensive named “Operation Vivaldi” this year has reclaimed 175 square kilometres (67 square miles) of previously occupied land around Lyman.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the news agency that Operation Vivaldi was successful but incomplete. To get as far as Kryva Luka, Russian sources acknowledged that Ukraine has recaptured settlements west of it. They blamed the Russian communications strategy of claiming settlements that have not been captured, giving away the plan of attack.
That preparation seems to be yielding results. Ukraine’s Ministry of Defence said its campaign to disrupt the flow of Russian ammunition and fuel to the front struck a record number of air defence assets and targets more than 50km (30 miles) away in September. Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed Russia had captured 1,300sq km (500sq miles) of Ukraine in September, echoing claims by his generals.
The Institute for the Study of War, which monitors territorial advances using geolocated, open-source data, said Russia actually lost 80sq km (30sq miles) during that month. The Russian casualty rate rose to a record for 2026 of 46,230 in September, according to Ukraine’s military. Of these, 33,087 – more than 70 percent – were confirmed kills, said Ukraine.
The commander of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, Robert Brovdi, said enemy casualties were up by 40 percent in the first five days of October, compared with the same period in September. The Ukrainian military on October 7 counted 1,545,950 Russian dead and wounded for the entire full-scale invasion since 2022. Putin’s response has been to intensify bombing, causing civilian suffering.
Twenty-two people, five of them children, were killed in the city of Pryluky, in the northern Chernihiv region, when a Russian cruise missile demolished a five-storey apartment building on October 7, Putin’s birthday. Ukraine’s Air Force said Russia unleashed 130 drones and 48 cruise missiles across 12 regions that day, as well as ballistics. At least two more people died in Kyiv and two in Oleksandria.
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