section_path: Events/Russian offensives and Ukrainian incursion (April 2024 – present)/Russian spring and summer offensives
section_name: Russian spring and summer offensives
paragraph_text: Russian spring and summer offensives
  
  On 10 May 2024, Russia began a renewed offensive in Kharkiv Oblast. Russia managed to capture a dozen villages, and Ukraine had evacuated more than 11,000 people from the region since the start of the offensive by 25 May. Ukraine said on 17 May that its forces had slowed the Russian advance, and by 25 May Zelenskyy said that Ukrainian forces had secured "combat control" of areas where Russian troops entered the northeastern Kharkiv Oblast. Russian officials said that they were "advancing in every direction" and that the goal was to create a "buffer zone" for embattled border regions. The White House said on 7 June that the offensive had stalled and was unlikely to advance further.
  
  Following the Russian success in the battle of Avdiivka, their forces advanced northwest of it to form a salient, and by mid-April 2024 reached the settlement of Ocheretyne, capturing it in late April and further expanding the salient in the succeeding months. Russian forces also launched an offensive towards the city of Chasiv Yar in early April, a strategically important settlement west of Bakhmut, and by early July had captured its easternmost district. Another offensive in the direction of the city of Toretsk was launched on 18 June, with the goal of capturing the city, and according to Ukrainian military observer and spokesperson Nazar Voloshyn, flanking Chasiv Yar from the south. Russian forces advanced to expand the salient northwest of Avdiivka in July, and on 19 July, made a breakthrough allowing them to begin advancing towards the operationally significant city of Pokrovsk.