Russia claims capture of two more Ukrainian villages; Kyiv dismisses reports as propaganda
MOSCOW, May 27 (Reuters) — Russia’s Defense Ministry announced on Wednesday that its troops had captured two more settlements in Ukraine: Hraniv, a border village in the northeastern Kharkiv region, and Vozdvyzhivka, located in a contested area of the southeastern Zaporizhzhia region. The claims, if verified, would mark incremental gains in Moscow’s months-long offensive.
Ukrainian authorities and independent battlefield analysts quickly pushed back. Ukraine’s 14th Army stated that Hraniv remained under Ukrainian control, calling the Russian report false. In a Facebook post, the unit said its forces “are reliably holding designated defensive lines, effectively repelling enemy offensive actions and inflicting significant losses in personnel and equipment.”
DeepState, a widely followed Ukrainian war blog that tracks combat developments along the roughly 1,250-kilometer (775-mile) front using open-source intelligence, also cast doubt on Moscow’s account. It said a small group of Russian servicemen briefly entered Vozdvyzhivka earlier this month but were either killed or driven out.
The latest back-and-forth echoes a pattern that has become routine in the 27-month-old war: Russia’s Defense Ministry routinely reports the capture of small settlements, while Ukraine often denies the claims or acknowledges only temporary incursions. The competing narratives reflect not only the fluid nature of frontline fighting but also an intensified information war, where both sides seek to shape domestic and international perceptions of battlefield momentum.
On Tuesday, Ukraine’s 14th Army similarly denied Russia’s assertion that it had taken one of two villages in the Sumy region, a border area where Moscow has signaled a desire to expand a buffer zone. Russia, which already occupies roughly 20% of Ukrainian territory, has been focused on securing full control of the eastern Donetsk region, announcing village-by-village gains for weeks.
Yet in recent statements, Ukraine’s military has argued that Russian advances have slowed considerably, claiming its forces are now in their strongest defensive position in months. Analysts say the attritional nature of the war, combined with Western arms supplies and Ukrainian fortifications, has made large-scale breakthroughs difficult for either side. The dispute over Hraniv and Vozdvyzhivka underscores how even small territorial changes are heavily contested both on the ground and in the public domain.
(Reporting by Reuters; additional context by the editor; editing by Andrew Osborn, Ron Popeski and Stephen Coates)