The head of the Russian paramilitary group Wagner said Friday that his troops had taken Berkhovka, north of Bakhmut, a key town that Moscow has been trying to conquer for months.
“[Berkhovka] is completely under our control,” Yevgeny Prigozhin said in a statement.
Ukrainian forces have responded to around 90 Russian attacks in the past 24 hours, with the main targets being areas in northeastern and eastern Ukraine, Kiev military authorities announced Thursday.
The Ukrainian army’s General Staff said the Russian offensive was concentrated in the northeastern Kharkiv region and neighboring Lugansk and Donetsk regions in the east, both of which border Russia.
In the strategic town of Bakhmut, the Ukrainian army said fighting was continuing “street to street” as control of the area would allow each side a safe corridor for transporting weapons and soldiers.
Russia began the war against Ukraine on February 24, 2022, with a large-scale invasion, after having concentrated thousands of troops on the borders with the neighboring country.
The number of civilian and military casualties is unknown, but several sources, including the UN, have admitted that it will be considerably high.
At the end of September, Russia formalized the annexation of the Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk and Lugansk regions into internal legislation, after having done the same in 2014, with Crimea.
Neither kyiv nor the wider international community recognize Russian authority in the five annexed regions.
Source: TSF
