Ukrainian troops on Wednesday continued to defend the city of Bakhmut, in eastern Ukraine, despite the continued push by Russian troops to take a virtually depopulated and devastated city after seven months of fighting, international agencies said.
The two sides continue to claim military successes in what is already considered the longest and bloodiest battle since the military invasion of Ukraine began more than a year ago.
Ukrainian officials, quoted by the US news agency Associated Press (AP), said Ukrainian ground forces shot down a Russian fighter near Bakhmut and made territorial gains in the northern parts of the city.
In turn, Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of the private paramilitary group Wagner, which led the attack on the city, assured in a message published on a social network that Russian troops had taken control of Zaliznyanskoye and strengthened the siege of Bakhmut .
The information provided by the two sides cannot immediately be independently confirmed.
The battle for Bakhmut intensified after Russian troops captured the nearby town of Soledar in January.
Russian forces need control of Bakhmut to ramp up pressure on larger regions of Donetsk province they still don’t control, though officials believe capturing the city will have limited impact on the course of the war .
An assessment last weekend by the British Ministry of Defense indicated that paramilitary units from the Wagner Group already had parts of eastern Bakhmut under control, with the river that crosses the town demarcating the front line.
Also over the weekend, the Institute for the Study of War think tank in Washington revealed that Russian troops and Kremlin-affiliated Wagner Group mercenaries continued to launch ground attacks, but there were no signs of breaking ground in Bakhmut.
Russian forces surrounded the city from three positions, leaving only a narrow corridor to the west operational for the Ukrainians. The only road connecting to the west was plagued by Russian artillery, forcing Ukrainians to often use secondary roads despite the difficulties caused by the thaw and mud.
On Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky discussed the situation in Bakhmut with military and intelligence chiefs, with everyone agreeing on the need to preserve and defend the city, the presidential office said.
The military offensive launched by Russia in Ukraine on February 24, 2022 has so far led to the flight of more than 14.6 million people – 6.5 million internally displaced persons and more than 8.1 million to European countries – according to the latest data from the UN, which classifies this refugee crisis as the worst in Europe since World War II (1939-1945).
At least 18 million Ukrainians need humanitarian aid and 9.3 million need food aid and shelter.
The Russian invasion – justified by the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, with the need to “denazify” and demilitarize Ukraine for Russian security – was condemned by the international community at large, which responded by sending weapons to Ukraine and Russia political and economic sanctions.
The UN presented 8,231 dead civilians and 13,734 wounded as confirmed since the start of the war, underlining that these numbers are far below the real ones.
Source: DN
