Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky revealed on Monday that he had ordered the army to strengthen the defenses of the city of Bakhmut, in the east of the country, which Russia has been trying to capture for several months.
“I have asked the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces to find the right forces to help them in Bakhmut. There is not a single part of Ukraine that can be said to be abandoned,” Zelensky said in his usual video message.. “There is no Ukrainian trench where the resilience and heroism of our soldiers is not valuable”he added.
Zelensky reiterated that the Ukrainian armed forces defend and will continue to defend all of Ukraine. “When the time comes, we will liberate every town and village in our country. And we will make the occupier answer for every shot against Ukraine, for every vicious act against Ukrainians,” he promised.
The city, which had a population of some 70,000 before the war, has become a symbol of the struggle between the Kiev and Moscow forces for control of the industrial region of Donbass, with both sides suffering heavy casualties.
The goal is to “exhaust the enemy”
A spokesman for the Ukrainian army stated, also on Monday, that the aim of the defense of Bakhmut, which Kiev decided to maintain despite the fragile situation, is “to exhaust the enemy and destroy his weapons”.
Hours earlier, the commander of the operations group on the Donbass front, Oleksandr Syrskyi, indicated that the situation in the provincial city of Donetsk had reached “the highest point of tension”.
“The Russians have failed to take Bakhmut for more than seven months,” armed forces spokesman Serhiy Cherevaty told public television. “Our troops are eliminating the potential of the enemy so that it will be easier for the army, which is preparing intensely, to drive the enemies out of our country with the new weapons systems.”
Cherevaty also reported that in its withdrawals from Soledar, Severodonetsk and Lisichansk, the Ukrainian army “inflicted the greatest possible losses on the enemy”.
And while Bakhmut “doesn’t represent that much value” from an operational point of view, the armed forces continue to “defend every meter of land, draining the morale, personnel and weapons of the Russians.”
Source: DN
