A Ukrainian soldier sits in a trench on the frontline near Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Tuesday, July 4 2023 (AP photo)

The Russian Defense Ministry said on Friday that Ukrainian forces have lost 280 soldiers and 10 pieces of military equipment in the Donetsk direction over the past 24 hours.

The ministry noted that Ukrainian forces are continuing to make unsuccessful attempts at a counteroffensive in the Donetsk and Krasniy Lyman directions over the past 24 hours, while Russia's armed forces have repelled 16 attacks by Ukrainian forces in the Donetsk direction and three in the Krasniy Lyman direction.

"During the hostilities, the enemy lost up to 280 Ukrainian military men, three armored combat vehicles, four vehicles, a Polish-made Krab self-propelled artillery mount, a D-20 howitzer, and a US-made AN/TPQ-36 counter-battery radar," the ministry said in a statement, adding that Ukraine also lost up to 210 soldiers in the South Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia directions in the same time period.

Recent updates reveal that Ukraine has recently acquired cluster bomb munitions from the US.

On July 13, Brigadier General Aleksandr Tarnavsky told CNN that Washington has already sent the cluster munitions promised to Kiev, reaffirming that the weapons are now with the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The US also confirmed this information.

Tarnavsky said “We just got them, we haven’t used them yet, but they can radically change [the battlefield],” adding that the cluster munitions, according to his claims, could assist Ukrainian Forces in pushing Russia away from their lines of defense.

In turn, Joint Staff Director for Operations Lt. General Douglas A. Sims confirmed during a press briefing that "There are cluster munitions in Ukraine at this time," revealing that even prior to the US delivery there had been cluster munitions available in Ukraine provided by third-party countries.

On another note, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Thursday that Russia will consider the presence of F-16 fighter jets in Ukraine sent from the West as a "nuclear" threat due to their capacity to carry atomic weapons.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been desperate for fighter jets, repeatedly pushing for advanced jets from the West, but Kiev's international supporters had balked at doing so until recently.

"Russia cannot ignore the ability of these aircraft to carry nuclear weapons. No amount of assurances will help here," Lavrov was quoted as saying by the Russian foreign ministry.

"In the course of combat operations, our servicemen are not going to sort out whether each particular aircraft of this type is equipped to deliver nuclear weapons or not."

"We will regard the very fact that the Ukrainian armed forces have such systems as a threat from the West in the nuclear sphere."