Russia Suffers Heavy Losses Near Avdiyivka, U.K. Says, As Kyiv-Backed Peace Talks Begin In Malta

Russian forces shelled the center of the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson on October 27, injuring several people and damaging more than 12 residential buildings, the head of the city’s military administration said.

Roman Mrochko said on Telegram that one of the injured people was transported to a hospital for treatment. He posted photos on Telegram showing three sites with piles of rubble.

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Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said the center of Kherson was targeted in the evening and “the entire city trembled.”

Emergency workers rescued two women, include one in her 80s, who had been unable to escape a building. They also brought a fire under control, the service said on Telegram.

Kherson city, which was partially liberated by Ukrainian troops one year ago, has been constantly targeted by Russian shelling from across the Dnieper River.

The Russian Defense Ministry said the Ukrainian military has lost 485 troops in the Kherson region over the past week “as a result of preemptive operations by Russian forces and artillery fire.” The Russian attacks also destroyed 11 field artillery guns and 20 vehicles, the ministry said, according to TASS.

In the area near Avdiyivka, where fighting has been especially intense over the past weeks, a spokesman for a Ukrainian military mechanized brigade told RFE/RL that Ukrainian forces have successfully repelled attacks.

The area is just north of the city of Donetsk in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, where Russian troops have been mounting an offensive.

The spokesman, Anton Kotsukon, said a Russian flag hoisted over the ash pit of the Avdiyivka coke plant did not stand for long.

“Russians like to do this trick — to run somewhere, put up a flag, take a picture or videotape it, and then spread it [on social media],” Kotsukon said.

But he said heavy fighting for the territory continues and there are no trees or other greenery in which to hide.

“Our defense forces constantly monitor the situation around this place, and as soon as they detect any movement of the occupiers — even if it is one or two occupiers — they immediately pour everything possible there,” Kotsukon said.

It is not possible for RFE/RL to verify either side’s battlefield claims.

WATCH: RFE/RL joins a Ukrainian border patrol as it monitors the Dnieper River in the country’s northern Chernihiv region where it borders Belarus. Russian forces entered Ukraine from Belarus at the start of its full-scale invasion in 2022. Kyiv has since strengthened its defenses in the area. One border guard told RFE/RL that the Belarusian military was “very cautious” as Ukrainian boats patrol the waters.

Earlier on October 27, a Russian missile struck a fire department in Izyum in Ukraine’s northern Kharkiv region, injuring at least eight rescue workers and damaging the facility, Ukrainian officials said.

“The building itself and 13 pieces of equipment were also damaged,” the State Emergency Service said in a statement, adding that four of the wounded rescuers were receiving medical treatment in the hospital.

The agency shared several images on social media that showed a wrecked building and fire engines.

Regional authorities said the attack was launched at around midnight, but didn’t say what types of missiles had been used.

Russian troops also launched two waves of Shahed drone attacks on the southern regions of Mykolayiv and Kherson overnight, the Ukrainian military said.

Ukraine’s air forces destroyed five of the six Russian drones launched in that attack, according to Natalya Humenyuk, a spokesperson for the southern military command.

“Unfortunately, there was a hit on an infrastructure object, a fire broke out, but it is not critical, it was localized,” Humenyuk told Ukrainian media. She said that there were no casualties.

The reports could not be independently verified.

Russia, meanwhile, said it had thwarted a Ukrainian drone attack near the Kursk nuclear plant in Russia’s south, amid reports of an explosion damaging a warehouse storing nuclear waste.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said there were no casualties or damage in the blast, which has not been independently verified, and that radiation levels were normal. Officials said the plant was operating as usual.

Nearly 70 combat clashes took places over the past day, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said in its regular updates early on October 27.