Russia is fighting to capture Ukraine’s second largest city at a high attrition rate and the cost of warfare on its troops has been leaked by its own troops who have highlighted the grim picture.

Only 12 out of 100 soldiers were found alive after Russian unit – fifth company of the 1009th regiment – came under Ukrainian fire and drones in nearby Vovchansk city, said one of the soldiers Anton Andreev, reported The Guardian.

“They just chop us up. We are sent under machine guns, under drones in daylight, like meat. And commanders just shout ‘forward and forward’,” he said in a video message, the report added.

The heavy losses has also forced Russia to withdraw its troops from the Kharkiv frontline, said Ukrainian military officials.

“Ukrainian Kharkiv Group of Forces Spokesperson Yuriy Povkh stated that elements of the Russian 138th Motorized Rifle Brigade (6th Combined Arms Army [CAA], Leningrad Military District [LMD]) are unsuccessfully attacking in the Kharkiv direction and that the Russian military command is trying to withdraw degraded elements of the 25th Motorized Rifle Brigade (6th CAA, LMD) and 83rd Separate Guards Airborne (VDV) Brigade that have become combat-ineffective due to high losses,” reported The Institute for the Study of War.

Vladimir Putin can start peace talks with Ukraine leadership as soon as “tomorrow” if they leave our soil first, the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said as he wrapped up the peace summit in Switzerland.

“Russia can start negotiations tomorrow if they pull out of our territories,” he said, stating that Moscow’s presence at negotiations would demonstrate its willingness for peace.

He also denied falling back on diplomatic means to solve the intensifying battlefield offensive and said Ukraine has always called for peace, reported BBC.

At the Swiss event, the challenge was to talk tough on Russia but open the door for it to join a peace initiative.“Many countries… wanted the involvement of representatives of the Russian Federation,” Zelensky said. “At the same time, the majority of the countries do not want to shake hands with them (Russian leaders)… so there are various opinions in the world.”

Ukrainian firepower has been improving since U.S. lawmakers approved a much-needed military aid package this spring, though not quickly enough to halt the Russian offensive in eastern Ukraine.

Although the influx of Western munitions has shrunk Kyiv‘s glaring artillery disadvantage, Moscow’s forces are still gaining ground along the snaking front line and will likely continue to do so through the summer, when the drier ground and longer days will only aid their push.

Ukraine is still on the defensive in the Donetsk region, enabling Moscow’s forces to inflict heavy losses during Ukrainian troop rotations and bringing them closer to crucial Ukrainian supply routes.

Peter Pellegrini was sworn in as the president of Slovakia on Saturday in a ceremony that took place amid heightened security following an assassination attempt on his close ally, populist Prime Minister Robert Fico, a month ago.

Pellegrini called for national unity in his speech at a special session of Parliament that took place at the seat of the Slovak philharmonic, becoming Slovakia’s sixth president since it gained independence after the disintegration of Czechoslovakia in 1993.

“We are one nation, one society, one Slovakia,” he said.

Countries resumed talks Sunday on how to iron out issues of nuclear safety, prisoner exchanges and exports of food from Ukraine that have arisen due to Russia‘s two-year war there, and ways to bring peace to Ukraine — even though Moscow is not represented.

Leaders from many Western countries and others including Ecuador, Somalia and Kenya were meeting in the Swiss resort of Bürgenstock to lay out their visions of what peace could look like in Ukraine one day. Many hope that Russia will join in one day, but say it needs to agree to respect Ukraine’s territory — about one quarter of which it occupies.

Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni on Saturday dismissed a cease-fire offer for Ukraine by Russian President Vladimir Putin as “propaganda,” as she wrapped up a Group of Seven summit that saw a deal reached for a $50 billion loan to Ukraine.

The loan will be provided by the U.S., U.K., Canada and possibly Japan, Meloni said. The frozen Russian assets to be used as collateral are mainly in Europe, “so Europe is already contributing by identifying the guarantee mechanism,” she added.

The loan agreement was reached at the opening Thursday of the two-day annual meeting of leaders from the G7 countries of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States in southern Italy’s Puglia region.

Several hundred LGBT Ukrainian servicemen and their supporters marched in central Kyiv Sunday to demand more rights and highlight their service to their country in its war with Russia.

The servicemembers — many wearing rainbow and unicorn patches on their uniforms — called on the government to grant them official partnership rights. They described the event as a pride march but it did not have the celebratory atmosphere of peacetime events and took place in the rain and under a heavy police guard amid threats from counterprotesters.

The role of LGBT members in the military has been credited with shifting public attitudes toward same-sex partnerships in the socially conservative country.

Mykola Kuleba, the founder of Save Ukraine, calls for international action to help bring home children who have been separated from their families by Russia’s invasion:

The move prompted the international criminal court to issue arrest warrants for both Putin and his children’s right’s commissioner, Maria Lvova-Belova.

In a special investigation, Tom Watling tells the story of five teenagers who were taken into Russia or Russian-occupied territory before eventually being rescued. Many others are still believed to be trapped: