RIGHT SPEAK: ‘Mines Everywhere’: UKRaine’s Offensive Is Proving a Hard Slog; Defense Ministry: UKR Advances 2 Kilometers in Multiple Directions; UKR Counteroffensive: Kyiv Official Says 38 Square Miles Retaken; Mapping Out UKR’s Counteroffensive Strategy, LIVE UPDATES and MORE

Photograph by Serhii Korovayny for The WSJ

‘Mines Everywhere’: Ukraine’s Offensive Is Proving a Hard Slog:

A few miles south of this village, at the tip of the deepest advance of Ukraine’s counteroffensive, a platoon from the Ukrainian 68th Jaeger Brigade fought at close range with Russian marines.

The Ukrainians took casualties from mortar and small-arms fire, but they inflicted more, and the Russians retreated.

“It was tough, but we won,” said the platoon commander, known by his call sign Yeti.

Having taken the position near the village of Urozhaine, the men found it covered in mines, he said. “There are mines everywhere, even inside houses,” he said.

Ukraine’s ambitious offensive to take back Russian-occupied land is proving to be a hard slog against dense minefields, well-prepared defenses and Russia’s superior air power.

After the first probing attacks yielded mixed results, Ukrainian forces have mostly paused their assaults in recent days as commanders draw lessons from the past two weeks and try to figure out how to punch through Russian lines without taking huge losses.

In the southern Zaporizhzhia and eastern Donetsk regions, Ukrainian troops are still working their way through Russia’s first lines of defense, and haven’t yet reached the main line of Russian fortifications.

Meanwhile, Russia continues to launch its own assaults in other parts of eastern Ukraine, with little apparent success, as well as continuing missile and drone attacks on Ukrainian cities.

In this bucolic part of Donetsk, Ukrainian troops are reconnoitering Russian positions in search of weak spots.

Some of the Ukrainians’ tactical successes so far have come at Blahodatne, Ukrainian for Blessed, and other villages along the Mokri Yaly River. A breakthrough here could allow Ukrainian forces to advance on the port cities of Mariupol and Berdyansk, threatening Russia’s grip on the country’s south. --->READ MORE HERE

Photo by Anatolii Stepanov/AFP via Getty Images

Defense Ministry: Ukraine advances 2 kilometers in multiple directions:

Ukraine's forces have advanced up to 2 kilometers in multiple directions but face heavy resistance, Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar said, summarizing the battlefield situation on June 16.

Maliar added that Ukrainian forces are conducting both offensive and defensive operations. They achieve partial success despite Russian artillery and air superiority.

Ukrainian troops have lost a single position in the sectors where they are on the defensive, she noted.

In the south, Maliar reported simultaneous offensives by Ukraine in several directions. Russians are supposedly reinforcing around Berdiansk and Mariupol.

"Virtually in all areas and directions where our units advance in the south, they achieve tactical success," she noted.

In the east, Russian forces are conducting multiple assault operations to dislodge Ukraine's troops. Moscow's forces have been recently drawing up forces from elsewhere towards the Bakhmut direction, Maliar said.

The deputy minister nevertheless noted that Ukraine's troops occupy dominant heights around the city and continue with localized offensives. The intensity of hostilities around Bakhmut has recently "somewhat decreased."

According to the Institute for the Study of War, Ukraine continues counteroffensive operations in at least three directions. On June 14, Maliar reported advances between 200 and 500 meters at various sectors in Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.

Earlier on June 11, Maliar reported that in the past week, the military had advanced 6.5 kilometers, regained 90 square kilometers, and liberated seven settlements — Lobkove, Levadne, Novodarivka, Neskuchne, Storozheve, Makarivka, and Blahodatne. --->READ MORE HERE