Ukraine soldiers paying a high price after 3 months of conflict

Three months have now passed since Russia begun its invasion of Ukraine, and with no end in sight those fighting continue to pay a high price.

It is unclear how many Ukrainians have died in combat, as the nation doesn't release figures.

But President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said up to a hundred soldiers may die every day in the east of the country now.

In the country's second largest city of Kharkiv, besieged for weeks, the Ukrainian counteroffensive pushed Russian troops back north and east.

Fighting still rages in the region bordering with Russia in the north, and the eastern provinces of the Donbas.

In one of the city's cemeteries, a portion of land is where fighters are being buried.

On Monday, a unit commander and a handful of fellow soldiers buried one of their comrades.

Hopefully the first and the last of his men, said commander Aleksii Kolesnikov.

Killed on May 10, 32-year-old Oleksander Matyukhin lost his life when shells set fire to the house in which his unit was stationed, in a location in the Kharkiv region the commander would not specify.

"I think it's a big price, people's lives are priceless and it's not right for young men to die. Diplomacy must solve this," he said.

"It's very terrifying, it's terrifying, the way mothers are left without sons."

Image: AP