Russia claims near full control of flashpoint Luhansk province in eastern Ukraine

On June 7, 2022, Russia claimed that its forces held nearly all of eastern Ukraine's Luhansk province, one of two provinces in the Donbas region. Capturing Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland has brought the Kremlin closer to its new goal of taking the Donbas after abandoning a bungled attempt to storm the capital Kyiv two months ago. On June 6, 2022, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Russian troops also intended to occupy the key southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia and said on June 1 that 20 per cent of the country was under Russian control.