• Ukrainian forces claim to have destroyed a Russian landing ship in the port city of Berdyansk. 
  • The ship, reportedly known as the Orsk, can transport up to 20 tanks or 40 armored personnel carriers. 
  • The Russian military has been struggling in combat, unable to secure Ukraine's capital city of Kyiv despite weeks of fighting and heavy bombing.

Ukrainian forces say they've blown up a Russian landing ship near Berdyansk, a port city in southeast Ukraine. 

A video circulating on social media shows large plumes of smoke and torrents of flames emanating from the ship, reportedly known as the Orsk, while two other ships appear to sail away. The open source research account Ukraine Weapons identified the two retreating ships as the Novocherkassk and the Caesar Kunikov, both of which were damaged in the attack, which they claim was caused by Ukraine's ballistic missile. One of those ships had a billowing fire on its foredeck, ahead of the ship's superstructure.

"This morning is starting out with good news!" the Ukrainian armed forces Twitter account posted, accompanied by pictures of the burning ship. "The large dock landing ship 'Orsk' belonging to the Black Sea fleet of the occupiers was destroyed in the port of Berdyansk which is occupied by Russian Federation forces."

On Monday, the Orsk sailed in Berdyansk to deliver military equipment, according to Russian state-run news agency TASS. Quoting Zvezda, a Russian television station, TASS claimed the ship could transport up to 20 tanks or 40 armored personnel carriers. 

"The arrival of the large landing craft at the port of Berdyansk is an epic event that opens up opportunities for the Black Sea in terms of logistics by using the port of Berdyansk infrastructure to the full extent," Zvezda cited a Russian officer as saying, according to TASS. 

Although much larger and more powerful than that of Ukraine, the Russian military has been struggling in combat, unable to secure Ukraine's capital city of Kyiv despite weeks of fighting and heavy bombing. The Pentagon announced on Wednesday that Russia had lost ten percent of its combat capability in the month since the country invaded Ukraine, Newsweek reported. 

Berdyansk is a Ukrainian port on the Sea of Azov that could help resupply the Russian offensive in the south, which has been besieging Mariupol nearby with increasingly indiscriminate attacks, leaving the city without heat or electricity for weeks.

Translations by Nikita Angarski.

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