Ukraine Army Successfully Lures Russian Soldiers, Blows Them Up Using 'Their Own Mines'

The Armed Forces of Ukraine on Monday successfully lured a Russian patrol unit to a mine they put in place, leaving one of Moscow's soldiers dead and another injured.

Ukrainian troops lured a Russian patrol unit to an area on Kotsiubynskyi Street in the temporarily occupied city of Mariupol by claiming soldiers from the Azov Regiment were hiding in a building nearby. The Russian soldiers were later blown up by their own mines.

At least one Russian military personnel died in the incident. One soldier also lost a leg in the explosion and is now being treated in a hospital in the eastern Donetsk region, Petro Andriushchenko, advisor to Mariupol's mayor, wrote on Telegram.

"Around 02:00, the occupiers' patrol [team] was blown up near Kotsiubynskyi Street, 5. The Resistance lured the patrol out by claiming that Azovites [soldiers from the Azov Regiment] were hiding at that address. As a result, one occupier lost a leg and is in a hospital in Donetsk. The other [Russian] now gets to perform with Kobzon," he wrote, as translated by Ukrainska Pravda.

"The most interesting detail is that the occupiers blew themselves up with their own mines; there's loads of them in that area and the [Russian] explosive specialists have been ignoring them so far... we used this opportunity."

Andriushchenko noted that the Ukrainian army is now taking advantage of the mines that the Russians have placed in the area. He also added that Ukrainian flags are beginning to appear across Mariupol three months after the city fell to the Russians.

Ukraine's Azov Regiment was one of the units that fought to prevent the Russians from taking over Mariupol. The unit has been labeled by the Kremlin as a terrorist organization, making them a target of Moscow's forces.

In recent weeks, Ukraine has been pushing to reclaim occupied territories from the Russians. On Monday, Kyiv's army successfully launched a counteroffensive in the southern region, liberating four villages near the city of Kherson, a source with knowledge of the matter told CNN. The villages reclaimed by the Ukrainian army include Nova Dmytrivka, Arkhanhel's'ke, Tomyna Balka and Pravdyne.

In a video interview published on YouTube on Monday, Oleksiy Arestovych, a senior adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky, claimed the Armed Forces of Ukraine have broken through Russian defenses in several frontline areas near the city of Kherson. He added that the Ukrainian army also shelled ferries that the Russians were using to supply their troops on the west bank of the Dnipro river.

As of Monday, the Russian army has lost a total of 47,100 soldiers, 4,269 combat armored vehicles and 3,188 fuel tanks, according to estimates from the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.