MOSCOW, May 5. /TASS/. The Ukrainian armed forces may launch a counteroffensive in the coming days, if not hours, the region’s Acting Governor Yevgeny Balitsky said on Friday, citing reports from the line of contact.

"We believe that a counteroffensive will begin very soon. We have information from the line of contact, up to 150 kilometers deep, and we realize that it can happen in the coming days, if not hours," he told the Soloviev Live TV channel.

When commenting on the decision to relocate local residents deeper into the region due to intensified shelling by Ukrainian forces, Balitsky noted that cities located the closest to the line of contact had come under attack in the previous week. According to him, in particular, schools and kindergartens came under indiscriminate fire. "We could not remain indifferent to the situation," the acting regional governor said.

The New York Times reported on April 25, citing leaked Pentagon and US intelligence documents, that Ukrainian forces were planning to launch a counteroffensive in the southern direction in May. Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of private military company (PMC) Wagner, said on Wednesday that the Ukrainian armed forces’ offensive had effectively begun and could enter the active phase in the near future.