Rebel forces repel a Ukrainian attack near Donetsk city

An attack by the Ukrainian forces in northern Donetsk was driven back by Russian backed rebels, according to Russian language news account.

According to a news release posted on the Donetsk ministry of defense webpage, elements of the Ukrainian 57 Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade attempted to breakthrough near northern Donetsk city, near Zhabunka area Sunday night.

The news release said the attacks were made in conjunction with an earlier artillery attack in Petrovsky, Kiev and Kuibyshevsky districts of western Donetsk city.  This is the first time in a while that Ukrainian artillery has landed in all three western Donetsk districts at once.  Yasinovataya, Staromikhailovka, Avdievka and the Donetsk airport were all reported hit with Ukrainian fire just before the attack.

Ukrainian forces used heavy artillery and BMP-2 autocannon fire in their attacks.

Earlier in the evening Ukrainian forces hit rebel positions at Trudovskie and in the Petrovsky district of Donetsk.  Firefighters in Trudovskie came under Ukrainian artillery fire. One unidentified firefighter, said to be a commander of a firefighting unit in the village, was killed in the attack.  Two more were wounded.

Rebel media said that more than 150 artillery shells were fired in the course of the preparatory phase of the attack.

Rebel media has not specified the size of the attack, casualties, nor its estimates of casualties from the Ukrainians, which would indicate the attack was yet another probe intended to test the defenses of the rebels.

Ukrainian media did not comment on the attacks, but did note that a rumor floating around social media that their forces attempted to cross the line of contact at the Svetlodarsk arc, which is in northeastern Donetsk, was untrue.

The rumor was that an unidentified Ukrainian motorized rifle brigade, possibly the Ukrainian 58th Motorized Rifle Brigade, advanced two kilometers passed the line of contact and had dug in.  The denial sounded an awful lot like a description of the Ukrainian  attack in the past in the Svetlodarsk area last spring, which turned out to have been denied by rebel forces dug in in that area.

Elsewhere, in Lugansk, according to a news report posted in lb.ua, rebel forces hit several Ukrainian held towns with 82mm and 120mm mortars including Novotoshkovskovo, Novoaleksandrovka and Troitskoye.

One Ukrainian soldier was wounded in the mortar attack in Popasnaya.

Ukrainian media also said that rebel struck Ukrainian positions at Peski and at Avdievka.

Further south rebel artillery was recorded at Pavlopol and Chermalyk.