UKRAINE, KHARKIV OBLAST, June 4 — Explosive engineers destroyed 734 pieces of Russian explosive remnants in the Kharkiv region over the past week, said Artem Astakhov, head of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine in the Kharkiv region (SES), at a briefing.

Since the start of the full-scale war, pyrotechnic units of the SES have inspected about 7,000 hectares of territory and found and defused more than 94,000 explosive devices.

Gwara Media’s journalists reported that the HALO Trust, an international humanitarian demining organization, has demined siх plots of land in the Chuhuiv and Izium districts and handed them back to the local communities. According to the organization, the Kharkiv region is the most contaminated with explosive remnants of war. 

After the Russian occupation, more than 570,000 hectares of land in the Kharkiv region need to be inspected for mines and explosive devices. About 1.2 million hectares are considered to be contaminated. 

According to Kharkiv Oblast Governor Oleh Syniehubov, 138 demining teams are working on demining the region—and, to accelerate the process, another 300 are needed.

UPD from June 5, 1:49 p.m.: Mistranslation in the headline fixed.

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  • On May 1, at 12:10 a.m., a tractor hit an explosive device near the village of Hlynske, Izium district of Kharkiv region, reported the Kharkiv Oblast Governor Oleh Syniehubov. The explosion injured a 46-year-old driver.