The death toll from a weekend Russian missile attack on a residential apartment block in Chasiv Yar, eastern Ukraine, rose to at least 45 on Tuesday. Saturday’s strike destroyed the 5-storey building and damaged several others in the Donetsk region city. 9 people had been pulled out alive as the rescue operation continued.

At least 7 people were reportedly killed by a Ukrainian missile strike on a large ammunition store in the town of Nova Kakhovka, in Russia-occupied Kherson, in a strike attributed to recently acquired US weapons. The explosion hit a warehouse close to a key railway line and a dam on the Dnieper river.

Russia has reportedly heavily shelled the eastern town of Bakhmut in the Donetsk region overnight in response to the Nova Kakhovka strike.

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, says Russia “doesn’t have the courage” to admit defeat. In a nationally televised address, he also mocked the Russian military’s apparent reliance on ageing weapons and Soviet-era tactics, and insisted the unity of his country’s citizenry, combined with the strength of Ukraine’s armed forces, meant the outcome of the war was “certain”.

Grain shipments via the Danube river have increased with the reopening of the Bystre canal. The number of foreign ships reaching Ukraine ports to help with grain exports has doubled to 16 within the last 24 hours.