November 9, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

A CNN team visiting the town of Toretsk, near the frontline in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region, has reported hearing heavy exchanges of artillery and gunfire.

The team was able to see the impact of incoming artillery from the Russian side and heard outgoing artillery from Ukrainian forces.

President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday said that “fierce positional battles” were taking place in the region.

“The situation is especially difficult in Donetsk region,” Zelensky said. “The occupiers' activity there remains at an extremely high level - dozens of attacks every day."

Russia was suffering “extremely large-scale losses,” he said.

As many as 300 Russian troops have been killed in action in the eastern region over the past seven days, according to an open letter published on a Russian military blog Monday.

In the letter, which was purportedly sent from the front lines to a regional governor in Russia, the men of the 155th Brigade of the Russian Pacific Fleet Marines say they were thrown into an "incomprehensible battle" in Donetsk.

Read more here.

The next NATO leaders summit will take place in Vilnius on July 11-12, NATO said on Wednesday.

The summit will be held for the first time in Lithuania and will focus on “strengthening the Alliance's collective defence and deterrence and on increasing support for Ukraine,” according to a NATO press release.

“It is expected that Finland and Sweden will participate in the summit as full-fledged members of the Alliance for the first time in Vilnius,” NATO said.

Finland and Sweden both announced their intention to join NATO in May following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in a historic policy shift after decades of military non-alignment.

NATO formalized its invitation to the two countries on July 29, after Turkey dropped its long-standing opposition a month earlier, removing a major hurdle to Finland and Sweden joining the alliance.

The ratification process usually takes about a year, as the parliaments of all individual 30 NATO countries need to approve new members.

CNN's Sophie Tanno contributed to this report

Ukraine’s post office has released a holiday stamp designed by an 11th-grade girl from Mykolaiv, Valeria Mykhailova, who was forced to flee the country. The girl's design was chosen after she won a public competition.

The illustration, called “Separated by War,” depicts a split image of a woman sitting by a Christmas tree, watching fireworks, and a man sheltering next to a wall, reloading his rifle.

“Everyone can understand the depth of this idea, as well as the emotions of the author herself, whose hometown has not been shelled for only 46 days since the beginning of the war,” Igor Smelyansky, the CEO of Ukrposhta, the Ukrainian postal service, said on Telegram.

“That is why I really want this Christmas and New Year stamp to become for you another symbol of invincibility and a reminder that we will stand against all odds and raise a glass to our victory on December 31, with or without electricity!” Smelyansky added.

Representatives for Brittney Griner have confirmed they do not know her current location or condition after attorneys for the US basketball star said she was being transferred to a Russian penal colony on Wednesday.

Some background: Last month, Griner lost her appeal against a nine-year drug sentence following her detention in February and conviction in August for deliberately smuggling drugs into Russia. She has repeatedly apologized for bringing a small amount of cannabis into the country, where she played basketball in the off-season.

Russian penal colonies are known for their lack of hygiene and access to medical care, with inmates often subjected to manual labor.

Russian forces hit the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro with self-detonating drone attacks early Wednesday, seriously wounding four and causing a large fire to break out, according to a spokesman for the Odesa regional administration.

CNN cannot independently confirm Bratchuk’s claim. 

Some context: Self-detonating drones have played a significant role in the conflict since Russia launched its invasion in late February. They are capable of circling for some time in an area identified as a potential target and striking only once an enemy asset is identified.

Russia has launched a series of drone attacks across Ukraine in recent weeks, striking vital civilian infrastructure and sowing terror in Ukrainian cities far from the front lines of the war.

US women’s basketball star Brittney Griner is in the process of being moved to a Russian penal colony where she is due to serve the remainder of a nine-year drug smuggling sentence that was upheld in late October.

Griner “is now on her way to a penal colony,” her attorneys said in a statement to CNN Wednesday.

Read more here.

Kyiv's forces destroyed two Russian ammunition depots in southern Ukraine on Tuesday, according to the Ukrainian military.

Ukraine's Operational Command South said on Facebook Wednesday that the depots were in Snihurivka, Mykolaiv region, and Kostromka, in neighboring Kherson.

The command also listed losses for Russia across southern Ukraine over the past 24 hours, including four tanks, a "Tor-M2" anti-aircraft missile system, an "Acacia" self-propelled howitzer, two mortars and nine armored vehicle units.

Some 55 Russian troops were also killed, it added.

The statement said Russian forces were seeking out Ukrainian resistance activists and attempting to disrupt channels of information by dismantling mobile communication towers.

CNN cannot independently verify the Ukrainian military’s claims. 

Some context: Russia has probably lost half its main battle tanks and used up the majority of its precision-guided weapons in a war that has become a “massive strategic failure” for the Kremlin, Colin Kahl, the Pentagon’s Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, said Tuesday. 

Ramzan Kadyrov, the pro-Kremlin leader of Russia's Chechnya region, has dismissed as "enemy propaganda" reports that his loyalist troops suffered heavy losses in recent fighting in the Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine.   

In a video posted to his Telegram account late Tuesday, Kadyrov responded to Ukrainian claims that many Chechen troops from the Akhmat battalion had been killed in the city of Lysychansk. Ukraine's General Staff said earlier that at least 30 Chechen fighters had been killed when their unit was destroyed and up to 15 others wounded.

He claimed Chechen squads were "doing very well" in Ukraine, adding his troops were preparing "more surprises" for Ukrainian forces. "These are not empty words,” he warned.

Chechen fighters: Kadyrov has been accused by international and independent observers of gross human rights violations in his home territory and beyond. He leads sizeable paramilitary forces that —  while formally a part of Russian security structures —  have personal loyalty to him. 

Russia has probably lost half its main battle tanks and used up the majority of its precision-guided weapons in a war that has become a “massive strategic failure” for the Kremlin, Colin Kahl, the Pentagon’s Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, said Tuesday. 

Kahl said Russia has suffered “tens of thousands of casualties” since the war began in February, which is “orders of magnitude” more than the Soviet Union suffered in Afghanistan. 

Kahl noted that there is considerable bipartisan support for Ukraine moving forward, but what that support looks like and what Ukraine’s military needs going forward may change.