Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday declared victory in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk, one day after Ukrainian forces withdrew from their last remaining bulwark of resistance in the province.
Russian Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu reported to Putin in a televised meeting yesterday that Russian forces had taken control of Luhansk, which together with neighboring Donetsk makes up Ukraine’s industrial heartland of the Donbas.
Shoigu told Putin that “the operation” was completed on Sunday after Russian troops overran the city of Lysychansk, the last stronghold of Ukrainian forces in Luhansk.
Photo: AFP
Putin, in turn, said that the military units “that took part in active hostilities and achieved success, victory” in Luhansk, “should rest, increase their combat capabilities.”
Putin’s declaration came as Russian forces tried to press their offensive deeper into eastern Ukraine after the Ukrainian military confirmed that its forces had withdrawn from Lysychansk on Sunday.
Luhansk Governor Serhii Haidai yesterday said that Ukrainian forces had retreated from the city to avoid being surrounded.
“There was a risk of Lysychansk encirclement,” Haidai said, adding that Ukrainian troops could have held on for a few more weeks, but would have potentially paid too high a price.
“We managed to do centralized withdrawal and evacuate all injured,” Haidai said. “We took back all the equipment, so from this point withdrawal was organized well.”
The Ukrainian General Staff said Russian forces were now focusing their efforts on pushing toward the line of Siversk, Fedorivka and Bakhmut in the Donetsk region, about half of which is controlled by Russia.
The Russian army has also intensified its shelling of the key Ukrainian strongholds of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk, deeper in Donetsk.
On Sunday, six people, including a nine-year-old girl, were killed in the Russian shelling of Sloviansk and another 19 people were wounded, local authorities said.
Kramatorsk also came under fire on Sunday.
An intelligence briefing yesterday by the British Ministry of Defence supported the Ukrainian military’s assessment, adding that Russian forces would “now almost certainly” switch to capturing Donetsk.
The briefing said the conflict in the Donbas has been “grinding and attritional,” and is unlikely to change in the coming weeks.
While the Russian army has a massive advantage in firepower, military analysts say that it does not have any significant superiority in the number of troops. That means Moscow lacks resources for quick land gains and can only advance slowly.
In his nightly video address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy acknowledged the withdrawal, but vowed that Ukrainian forces would fight their way back.
“If the command of our army withdraws people from certain points of the front where the enemy has the greatest fire superiority, in particular this applies to Lysychansk, it means only one thing: We will return thanks to our tactics, thanks to the increase in the supply of modern weapons,” Zelenskiy said.
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