While Russian troops are trying to capture the city of Avdiyivka in eastern Ukraine, the Associated Press agency has obtained aerial photographs that show significant losses suffered by Moscow, writes News.ro. A Ukrainian military drone captured this footage this month near Stepovoy, a village north of Avdiivka, where some of the fiercest fighting took place.

War in Ukraine: Picture from the frontPhoto: Oleksiy Babenko / AP / Profimedia

In two separate sequences seen by the AP, the bodies of about 150 soldiers – most of them in Russian uniforms – were strewn along the rows of trees where they had sought shelter. The village itself is in ruins. The rows of trees that separated the fields have been burned, and the fields are littered with artillery shells and drone grenades. The drone that shot the video said that Ukrainians may have been among the dead.

The AP image was provided by the Ukrainian BUAR unit of the 110th Mechanized Brigade, which is involved in combat operations in the area. The unit said the footage was taken on December 6 between Stepov and nearby railway tracks, and that many of the bodies had been left there for weeks.

The AP was able to confirm the location by comparing the footage with maps and other drone footage of the same area taken six days later by the 47th Mechanized Brigade.

Russian forces launched an offensive on Avdiivka in October, which allowed them to make some progress but also caused thousands of casualties.

In the last 24 hours, 89 fights took place in Ukraine

Instead, in a daily report published on Facebook, the General Staff of the Armed Forces reported “89 combat operations” over the past day.

“In total, the (Russian army) launched 4 rocket launches, 72 airstrikes and 92 rocket salvo systems at the positions of our troops and populated areas,” the Armed Forces reported.

“Unfortunately, the attacks (…) resulted in the deaths and injuries of civilians. Private houses and other objects of civil infrastructure were destroyed or damaged,” Kyiv added.

More than 110 settlements in the Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhya, Kherson, and Mykolaiv regions became objects of artillery shelling.

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