‘The intensity is increasing’: Ukraine says first steps in counteroffensive have begun

Presidential adviser says supply lines and depots already being destroyed as preliminary operations get under way

Russia-Ukraine war - latest updates

Preliminary operations have already begun to pave the way for a counteroffensive against Russian occupying forces, a Ukrainian presidential adviser has said.

It's a complicated process, which is not a matter of one day or a certain date or a certain hour," Mykhailo Podolyak said in an interview with the Guardian. It's an ongoing process of de-occupation, and certain processes are already happening, like destroying supply lines or blowing up depots behind the lines.