The cities of Severodonetsk and Lisichansk, separated by the river, have been targeted for weeks as the last areas in the eastern Lugansk region still under Ukrainian control.
The cities of Severodonetsk and Lisichansk, separated by the river, have been targeted for weeks as the last areas in the eastern Lugansk region still under Ukrainian control.
Ukraine said on Monday that its forces had been pushed back from the center of Major industrial city Severodenetskwhere President Volodymyr Zelensky Described a fight for “literally every meter”.
The cities of Severodonetsk and Lisichansk, separated by the river, have been targeted for weeks as the last areas in the eastern Lugansk region still under Ukrainian control.
Regional governor Sergei Gede said on Monday that Russian forces were “gathering as much equipment” as possible to “besiege” Severodonetsk, and that they “push our troops from the center and continue to destroy our city”.
The local Azot chemical plant, where hundreds of civilians have reportedly taken refuge, was being subjected to “heavy shelling”, Mr Gede said.
He said that in Lisichansk, the bombing killed three civilians, including a six-year-old boy.
Eduard Basurin, a representative of pro-Russian separatists, said on Monday that Severodnetsk was “really” blocked after Russian forces blew up the “last” bridge connecting Lisichansk on Sunday.
“The Ukrainian units that are there are there forever. They have two options: to surrender or die,” said Mr. Basurin.
On Sunday, Mr Zelensky said the latest fighting in Severodnetsk was “very fierce”, adding that Russia was deploying underserved troops and using its troops as “cannon fodder”.
Ukraine’s military commander-in-chief Valery Zaluzhny said on Sunday that Russian artillery in that area gave him a tenfold advantage.
“Every meter of Ukrainian land is covered in blood – but not only ours, but also of the occupier.”
The capture of Severodonetsk would open the road for Moscow to another major city, Kramatorsk, in its move towards conquering the whole of the Donbass, a predominantly Russian-speaking region, partly after 2014. organized by pro-Russian separatists.
On Monday, Amnesty International accused Russia of war crimes in Ukraine, saying the attack on the northeastern city of Kharkiv – using several banned cluster bombs – had killed hundreds of civilians.
“Repeated bombing of residential areas” Kharkiv These are indiscriminate attacks that killed and injured hundreds of civilians, and thus constitute war crimes,” the rights group said in a report on Ukraine’s second largest city.
Away from the battlefield, WTO members gathered in Geneva on Sunday, with Russia’s war in wheat-producing Ukraine topping the agenda for global food security threats.
WTO spokesman Dan Pruzyn told reporters that tensions escalated during a closed-door session where several delegates condemned Russia’s war, including envoys from Kyiv, who met with a standing ovation.
The spokesman said that just before Russian Economic Development Minister Maxim Reshetnikov spoke, about three dozen delegates “walked out”.
In a field near the town of Mykolaiv in the south, the harvest has been delayed because of the need to undo the damage done by Russian troops passing through the area in March.
“We planted really late because we already needed to clean everything up,” said Nadia Ivanova, 42.
The farm godowns currently have 2,000 tonnes of grain from the previous season, but there are no takers.
The railway has been partially destroyed by the Russian military, while any ship that is sailing is in danger of sinking.
The war has prompted Finland and Sweden to abandon decades of military non-alignment and join the NATO alliance.
But Turkey is blocking their bids and NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said on Sunday that the issue could not be resolved in time for a coalition summit later this month.
talking to AFPMikhail Kasyanov, the Prime Minister of Russia from 2000 to 2004, said he thought President Vladimir Putin was “out of it”, after calling the Russian leader the country’s top officials for a dramatic meeting on February 24, three days before the invasion.
“I knew a different Putin,” said Mr. Kasyanov, 64, who served under Mr. Putin but has become one of the Kremlin’s most vocal critics.
Mr Kasyanov predicted the war could last two years and said it was imperative that Ukraine win.
“If Ukraine falls, the Baltic states will be next,” he said.
As well as punishing Moscow with unprecedented economic sanctions, the United States and Europe have sent arms and cash to Ukraine to help stifle Russia’s progress.
The Russian military said on Sunday that they had attacked a storehouse of weapons supplied by the US and the European Union in the city of Chortkiv in western Ukraine.
Russia’s defense ministry said the strike “destroyed a large depot of anti-tank missile systems, portable air defense systems and shells provided by the US and European countries to the Kyiv regime”.
Regional governor Volodymyr Trush said the strike – a rare attack by Russia in Ukraine’s relatively quiet west – injured 22 people.
Concerns over Ukraine’s largest nuclear power plant, Zaporizhzhya, eased on Sunday. Captured by Russian forces months earlier, but still operated by Ukrainians, the station stopped transmitting data on critical security measures two weeks ago.
But plant officials working with the International Atomic Energy Agency have succeeded in restoring transmission, the IAEA said.
Rafael Grossi, the director-general of the UN agency, said he still wants to send inspectors to the plant “as soon as possible”.