The Ukrainian army said on Sunday that it has pushed Russian forces back “three to eight kilometres” from the banks of Dnipro River.

Ukraine Pushes Russia From Dnipro River: The latest news emanating from the Russia-Ukraine battlefront, the Ukrainian forces have moved ahead pushing Russian troops from the Dnipro River. This development is being viewed as the “first measurable advance by Kyiv’s forces months into a disappointing counteroffensive.” The Ukrainian army said on Sunday that it has pushed Russian forces back “three to eight kilometres” from the banks of Dnipro River, the first measurable advance by Kyiv’s forces months into a disappointing counteroffensive.

Ukraine army spokeswoman Natalia Gumenyuk said, “Preliminary figures vary from three to eight kilometres, depending on the specifics, geography and landscape design of the left bank,” while addressing the Ukrainian television without specifying whether the Ukrainian military had complete control of the area or if the Russians had retreated.

In another major turn of events, Ukrainian troops on Saturday pushed back the aggressively advancing Russian troops forces positioned on the east bank of the Dnieper River, informed the Ukrainian military, a day after Ukraine claimed to have secured multiple bridgeheads on that side of the river that divides the country’s partially occupied Kherson region. This achievement is being perceived as a small but potentially significant strategic advance by the Ukrainian forces of footholds on the Russian-held bank of the Dnieper and represents a small but potentially significant strategic advance in the midst of a war largely at a standstill, reports AP.

The General Staff of Ukraine’s armed forces said its troops there had repelled 12 attacks by the Russian army between Friday and Saturday.

Now the Ukrainian military is trying to “push back Russian army units as far as possible in order to make life easier for the (western) bank of the Kherson region so that they get shelled less,” said the spokesperson for Ukraine’s Southern Operational Command Natalia Humeniuk adding that in response, the Russian military used “tactical aviation,” including Iranian-made Shahed exploding drones, to try to pin down Ukraine’s troops.

The wide river is a natural dividing line along the southern battlefront. Since withdrawing from the city of Kherson and retreating across the Dnieper a year ago, Moscow’s forces have regularly shelled communities on the Ukrainian-held side of the river to prevent Kyiv’s soldiers from advancing toward Russia-annexed Crimea.

Elsewhere, air defenses shot down 29 out of 38 Shahed drones launched against Ukraine, military officials reported. One of the drones that got through struck an energy infrastructure facility in the southern Odesa region, leaving 2,000 homes without power.

In the capital Kyiv, hundreds of people gathered to oppose corruption and to demand the reallocation of public funds to the armed forces. The demonstration was the 10th in a series of protests in Kyiv amid anger over municipal projects.

On Saturday, protesters held Ukrainian flags and banners bearing slogans such as “We need drones not stadiums.”

“I’ve organized demonstrations in more than 100 cities protesting against corruption in Ukraine and for more money, which should go to the army,” Maria Barbash, an activist with the organization Money for the Armed Forces, said. “The first priority of our budget — local budgets and the central budget — should be the army.”

(With agency inputs)