Ukraine Retakes Territory Seized At Invasion's Start After Kremlin Troops Flee

Ukraine consolidated its control of the Kharkiv region yesterday, raising flags on towns and villages occupied by Russian troops for six months, and reclaiming areas that were seized by Moscow on the first day of Vladimir Putin's invasion.

- Luke Harding,Dan Sabbagh

The state border service in Kyiv said it had liberated the city of Vovchansk, a couple of kilometres from the international border. Russian solders left on Sunday, it added, following the stunning Ukrainian counteroffensive.

In the space of a few days Ukraine has pushed the Russians out from more than 2,300 sq miles of territory, including zones in the south of the country where a separate counteroffensive is underway to recapture the city of Kherson.

Russian units have fled in disarray. Serhiy Haidai, the governor of the Luhansk region, said local partisans had raised the Ukrainian flag over the key town of Kreminna, which was "completely empty". Its occupiers had either left the area or were too scared to take it down, he suggested.

Russian battalions have fallen back to new positions east of the Oskil River, about 10 miles from the freshly liberated city of Izium. The city was almost entirely destroyed and more than 1,000 residents killed during five months of occupation and in recent fighting, Kyiv says.

Video confirmed the scale of the damage. It showed pulverised high-rise apartment blocks, trashed schools, blown-up bridges, and burned-out Russian military vehicles marked with Z. The Kremlin used Izium as a garrison and arms depot in its operation to seize the Donbas.