India, Nov. 8 -- The Russian Defence Ministry on Sunday released its daily battlefield summary claiming sweeping advances and heavy Ukrainian losses across the contact line in eastern and southern Ukraine, in a morning dispatch that presented a sharply different picture of the war's trajectory from the one being tracked by independent Western military analysts.

"The losses of the Ukrainian armed forces amounted to over 340 military personnel, three armoured personnel carriers, six armoured combat vehicles, 10 vehicles, an artillery piece and seven electronic warfare stations," Russia's Defence Ministry said in a statement, referring to combat against the Tsentr battlegroup alone.

In addition, up to 170 Ukrainian soldiers were eliminated...