Ukrainian troops are engaged in a “fierce” confrontation with Russian forces trying to seize Vougledar, southwest of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine, where fighting has intensified in recent days.
“Soon Vougledar could become a very important new success for us,” Denis Pushilin, head of the Moscow-appointed Donetsk region, said on Friday.
Both sides have claimed victory, but the city remains disputed, according to Kyiv. The spokesman for the Ukrainian army for the eastern area, Serguiy Tcherevaty, confirmed “fierce fighting”, while assuring that the Russians had been repelled.
“brutal” clashes
150 kilometers from Bakhmout, this mining town that had 15,000 inhabitants before the Russian invasion, “serious, brutal” clashes have been going on for several days. Russian troops have “established themselves in the southeast and east of the city,” said an official with the pro-Russian authorities in the eastern Donetsk region, Ian Gagin.
“The enemy is certainly looking to achieve success in this sector, but he is not succeeding thanks to the efforts of the Ukrainian Defense Forces,” he said on television. “The enemy exaggerates, and this is an understatement, their success,” he continued, concluding: “in the face of their losses, the enemy retreats.”
“The encirclement and future liberation” of this town “will change the balance of power at the front” by paving the way for an offensive towards Pokrovsk and Kurakhové, towns located further north, judged the leader of the Donetsk separatists, Denis Pushilin.
Towards a big attack on February 24?
Ukraine said this week that outnumbered Russian troops had intensified their attacks in the east, particularly on Vougledar and Bakhmout, the latter of which had been their target for months.
And a new Russian offensive is being prepared for February 24, a year after Russia invaded Ukraine, said Oleksii Danilov, secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine.
“Now they are preparing for maximum activation (…) and they think they will have some successes by the anniversary date,” he said on Radio Svoboda. This new offensive wave in preparation for February 24 “is not a secret,” she added.
According to the Institute for the Study of War, Russia seeks to “disperse” Ukrainian forces in order to “create the conditions for a decisive offensive operation.”
Capture of Soledar by the Russians
Russian soldiers and men from the Wagner paramilitary group recently captured Soledar, north of Bakhmout, a first success in many months and a series of setbacks for the Kremlin.
Also in the east, in Chassiv Iar, two people were killed on Friday and at least five wounded in Russian artillery fire, local authorities said.
Further north, in the Kharkiv region, the shelling of the town of Dvoritchna left another two dead, the Ukrainian presidency announced. The southern city of Kherson was also targeted by Russian shells, according to the same source.
Russia has mobilized hundreds of thousands of reservists and convicts to try to break through the Ukrainian lines and conquer the rest of Donbass, a vast industrial area in eastern Ukraine.
Source: BFM TV
