June 3, 2023 Russia-Ukraine news

We've wrapped up our live coverage for the day. You can read more about Russia's war in Ukraine here, or scroll through the updates below.

Russia is suffering “significant losses” during fighting around Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, according to Ukrainian military commander Oleksandr Syrskyi, who said his forces will continue to fight for the territory.

His comments come a day after Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said that 99% of his troops had left Bakhmut after handing over their positions to soldiers from the Russian military.

Here are other headlines to know:

Attacks in Russian territory: Russian officials have reported deadly attacks in at least four locations in western Russia's Belgorod region. Ukrainian-aligned units of Russian fighters are ramping up their incursions in border areas, bringing the war to Russian soil. Kyiv has yet to take responsibility for the assaults, but the attacks could be part of a ploy to destabilize and demoralize Russia, CNN's Sam Kiley writes. Read his full analysis here.

Strikes on both sides of frontline Ukraine: At least 20 people were wounded, including children, in a Russian attack Saturday evening in the Dnipropetrovsk region, the regional military administration said. And Russian and Ukrainian officials reported a series of explosions in Russian-occupied cities of the southern Zaporizhzhia region Saturday. No casualties were reported by either side following those attacks.

NATO discussions: Finland's accession to NATO highlights that Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine has been a "strategic failure," according to US Ambassador to Poland Mark Brzezinski. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told The Wall Street Journal in an exclusive video interview that he understands Ukraine will not be able to join NATO while its war against Russia is ongoing, saying, “We do not want to be in NATO during the war. It’s too late now. We should have been there before.”

Impending counteroffensive: Ukraine is ready to launch its much-anticipated counteroffensive in the war against Russia, Zelensky also told The Wall Street Journal. The president said he believes the counteroffensive will be successful, but he's not sure how long it will take. 

A Russian attack left at least 20 people wounded in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region Saturday, said Serhii Lysak, the head of the region's military administration. 

Five children are among those injured, Lysak said on Telegram.

Lysak said the explosion rocked Pidhorodne — a riverfront town outside Dnipro, the region's administrative center and one of the largest cities in Ukraine. The blast hit a two-story residential building, trapping people under the rubble, according to the regional leader.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky also blamed Russian forces for hitting the buildings, saying via Telegram that people were still buried in the wreckage.

Ukrainian State Emergency Services said two buildings caught fire after they were hit, but one of the blazes was already extinguished. 

Russian and Ukrainian officials have reported a series of explosions in Russian-occupied cities of the southern Zaporizhzhia region Saturday.  

No casualties were reported by either side following the attacks.

One of the region's Russian-installed leaders, Vladimir Rogov, said Russian air defenses shot down six rockets over Berdiansk, a port city at the southeastern tip of the region. He blamed Ukraine’s military for the attack.

The Russian-installed Berdiansk civil-military administration said even though the missiles were destroyed in the sky, fragments fell near a Catholic church and a bus station, damaging a car. 

The Russian-backed Rogov also reported a series of explosions in Melitopol, west of Berdiansk.

The city's Ukrainian mayor, Ivan Fedorov, commented on the blast in a post on Telegram, but did not immediately imply who was responsible. He is not currently in Melitopol.

Rogov also claimed Ukraine’s Armed Forces were behind a strike on the village of Chernihivka, located between the two large cities hit Saturday.  

CNN is unable to verify claims on battlefield developments.

Saturday's explosions mark the latest in a recent string of attacks on Russian-occupied territories in southern Ukraine.

The head of the Wagner private military company, Yevgeny Prigozhin, claimed in a Telegram post Saturday that unidentified Kremlin factions “are destroying (the) Russian state” and trying to sow discord between him and Chechen leadership and its fighters. 

Prigozhin said a conflict with Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov arose — but has since been settled — because of the Wagner chief's criticism toward Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov.

Prigozhin claimed that he criticizes the defense minister and the chief of the general staff because “they don’t do their job correctly.”

Prigozhin repeatedly berated Russian military leadership during the grinding battle in the eastern city of Bakhmut, accusing top brass of not providing enough ammunition. “They didn’t supply us with shells, and this is the reason why so many of my people got killed,” he said Saturday.

But Prigozhin said he never talked negatively about the Chechen leader or his “Akhmat” detachment. He also said he is not interested in “stirring up ethnic conflicts.” 

On Belgorod: Prigozhin commented on developments in Belgorod, the region that borders Ukraine and has seen recent shelling and cross-border incursions, which he called “a clear attempt to capture that area.” 

He criticized the Russian Defense Ministry over the handling of the incursions, which Moscow blames on Ukraine. Ukrainian officials have insisted that the groups going across the border are anti-Putin Russian nationals acting independently.

"The Ministry of Defense is not in a state to do anything at all as it de-facto doesn't exist — it is in chaos," Prigozhin said. 

"Dangerous games have become commonplace in the Kremlin towers,” the Wagner chief continued, referring to unidentified Kremlin factions. “They have been playing games for a while now not understanding what they are doing. They are simply destroying the Russian state today." 

“If the Ministry of Defense doesn’t stop what is happening in the Belgorod region soon enough, don’t stop that chaos that is happening around capturing of Russian Federation territory, then we (Wagner units) will certainly come to the Belgorod region and we will protect our people,” Prigozhin said, adding, “we won’t wait on the invitation.”

Russia continues to suffer “significant losses” during fighting around Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, the Commander of Ukraine’s Ground Forces Oleksandr Syrskyi said Saturday after visiting troops on the front line.

“The enemy continues to suffer significant losses in the Bakhmut direction," Syrskyi said on the messaging app Telegram. "Defense Forces (of Ukraine) continue to fight. We will win.” 

Syrskyi's comments came a day after Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the Russian private military company Wagner, said that 99% of his troops had left Bakhmut after handing over their positions to soldiers from the Russian military.

Bakhmut has been the site of one of the bloodiest battles between Russian and Ukrainian forces since the Kremlin launched its invasion last year. Prigozhin claimed victory and control of the city last month, though Ukraine says it continues to have a foothold on the southwestern edge of the city.

Reports suggest that front lines in and around the city have been largely static. In early May, while Wagner forces were pushing westward out from the center of Bakhmut, Ukrainian forces had been making limited territorial gains on higher ground to the northwest and southwest of the city.

The latest from the battlefield: In its daily operational update, Ukraine’s Armed Forces claimed on Saturday that Russia's attempted offensive actions near Ivanivske, a small town around 5 miles west of Bakhmut, were unsuccessful. Kyiv said that Russian forces had carried out air strikes on nearby Bila Hora and Chasiv Yar, as well as a missile strike on the town of Druzhkivka, in the same part of the Donetsk region. 

CNN is unable to verify claims on battlefield developments. 

Russian officials have reported deadly attacks in at least four locations in the Belgorod region and Ukrainian-aligned Russian units are ramping up their incursions, bringing the war to Russian territory.

At least seven people have been killed by shelling in Russian border regions since Friday, according to Belgorod's regional Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov.

Two men and a woman were killed in a barrage of 18 rockets fired on the village of Sobolevka, Gladkov said in a series of posts on his Telegram channel. A gas pipeline and a power line were also damaged in the strike.

Sobolevka, which is located in the Valuisky city district, is the easternmost location to have been struck over the past two weeks. A rail line runs through the village and enters Ukraine in Russian-occupied territory south of the attack, suggesting it may have been targeting Russia’s supply lines.

To the northwest along Russia's border with Ukraine, two women were killed in the village of Maslova Pristan when their car was hit by fire, Gladkov said. Two other women were killed in separate shellings on nearby villages.

Anti-Kremlin Russian fighters: Two units responsible for recent assaults on the border regions – Freedom for Russia Legion and the Russian Volunteer Corps – are made up of Russian soldiers opposed to President Vladimir Putin. Though not officially part of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, they effectively fall under the command of Ukraine’s security forces.

While the cross-border attacks have a military impact, forcing Russia to consider redeploying resources to protect what have been shown to be weak borders, they also appear designed to have an impact on Russian morale.

Legion spokesperson Alexei Baranovksiy appeared on Ukrainian television Saturday and was asked about the aims of the incursions. 

It was not about trying to “die heroically,” he said.

“This is a task to distract the Russian army from other directions; it is a task to gain combat experience, to show Russia that resistance (against Putin) is possible, and it is necessary to join it,” Baranovskiy said.

Ukraine is ready to launch its much-anticipated counteroffensive in the war against Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an exclusive video interview with The Wall Street Journal published Saturday. 

“I think that, as of today, we are ready to do it. We would like to have certain things, but we can't wait for it for months,” Zelensky said of the long-awaited military maneuvers.

The president said he believes the counteroffensive will be successful, but he's not sure how long it will take. 

“Everyone knows perfectly well that any counteroffensive in the world without control in the skies is very dangerous. Imagine what a military man feels, knowing he does not have a ‘roof’ and he can't understand how neighboring countries have that," Zelensky said about his dogged campaign for allies to supply Ukraine with F-16 fighter jets. 

According to the WSJ, Zelensky acknowledged Russia’s superiority in the skies, adding that a lack of protection against Russian air power means “a large number of soldiers will die” during the counteroffensive. 

“If everybody knows we need the protection for our skies, then what's the issue with (giving us) the modern jets? What is the issue?” he implored. 

On NATO: Zelensky also told the newspaper he understood Ukraine would not be able to join NATO while its war against Russia is ongoing, saying, “We do not want to be in NATO during the war. It’s too late now. We should have been there before.”

All NATO allies agree that "Ukraine will become a member of the alliance," NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday ahead of the alliance’s next summit, which is set to take place in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 11 and 12. 

Zelensky, who hopes to secure a pledge at the summit that Ukraine can join NATO after the war, told the WSJ, “If some countries do not see us in NATO and we do not get a signal in Vilnius, I think there is no point for Ukraine to be at this summit.”

Asked if he thought that signal would be given, Zelensky replied, “I don’t know. I’ll be honest with you, I don’t know.”  

Finland's accession to NATO highlights that Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine has been a "strategic failure," according to US Ambassador to Poland Mark Brzezinski.

"What's changed in the last week is that NATO has expanded in a way that just emphasizes the strategic failure of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin's decision to invade Ukraine," he said in an interview with CNN's Michael Smerconish on Saturday.  

"What we are seeing is an amplified total failure on the part of Putin regarding his decision to invade poor, weaker Ukraine. And there is no way, no way, Putin's war in Ukraine has improved the lives and the futures of the Russian people," he said.

His remarks echo those of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who visited Finland on Friday. Blinken also called Russia’s war a "strategic failure," saying it has diminished the country's influence and interests "for years to come."

Finland officially became the 31st NATO member in early April. The Russian invasion drove traditionally non-aligned Finland and Sweden to abandon their neutrality and seek to join the alliance.

When asked if any possible peace negotiations are ongoing, Brzezinski said:

"Every minute of every day, the American government stands ready to advance the path of diplomacy. But instead, Russia is advancing the path of aggression. What I thought was particularly important that Sec. Blinken emphasized yesterday is that we're going to make sure not only that the Ukrainian people win this war and survive, but that they thrive."

"We're committed to a path of making sure a lasting peace includes a complete reconstruction of Ukraine and a drawing into it — as it wants — into the Western institutional orbit. And that's the opportunity here: to have a renaissance, emerge out of this crime of a war in central and eastern Europe," he said.

Brzezinski also said he believes the majority of US lawmakers remain committed to providing assistance to and showing solidarity with Ukraine. He noted that he's hosted over 150 members of Congress from both parties, including former House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi and current Speaker Kevin McCarthy.