“We cannot give you the final judgment. We are still fighting for Lysychansk,” Zelenskyy told a news conference in Kyiv alongside Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. He noted that the territory could move rapidly from side to side.
Russian forces struck the city of Lysychansk and its environs in a total attempt to seize the last stronghold of resistance in the eastern Ukrainian province of Luhansk. Credit: Luhansk / AP Administration
Russian forces maintain an advantage in the area, he acknowledged, calling it a “weak spot” Ukrainian military.
The capture of Lysychansk gives the Russians more territory from which to intensify the attacks on Donetsk. In recent weeks, it was thought that Russian forces had about half of Donetsk, but it is unclear where things are now.
If Russia imposes itself on the Donbas, Ukraine would lose not only land, but perhaps the bulk of its most capable military forces, paving the way for Moscow to take more territory and strengthen its ability to dictate terms to Kyiv.
Since failing to take Kyiv and other areas of northern and central Ukraine early in the war, Russia has focused on the Donbas, launching fierce bombing and house-to-house fighting that devastated neighboring Lysychansk, Sievierodonetsk and the villages. nearby. Few details emerged from any city during the battles, which decimated their populations as people died or fled.
Russian forces already appeared to be advancing in Donetsk, concentrating rocket attacks on the large Ukrainian-controlled city of Slovyansk, where at least six people were killed, regional government spokeswoman Tatiana Ignatchenko told Ukrainian television.
Kramatorsk, another major city in the Donetsk region, was also criticized, the regional administration said.
Meanwhile, the exiled mayor of the Russian-occupied city of Melitopol said Ukrainian rockets had destroyed one of the city’s four Russian military bases.
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Attacks were also reported inside Russia, in a revival of the apparent sporadic Ukrainian attacks on the border. The governor of the Belgorod region in western Russia said Sunday that fragments of an intercepted Ukrainian missile killed four people. In the Russian city of Kursk, two Ukrainian drones were shot down, according to the Russian Defense Ministry.
Kursk regional governor Roman Starovoit said the Russian border town of Tetkino was under mortar fire.
AP