While much of the recent fighting has unfolded in southern Ukraine’s Kherson region, Russian soldiers are slowly edging closer to a city in eastern Ukraine. Bakhmut has remained in Ukrainian hands despite Moscow’s goal of capturing the entire Donbas.
Russia’s prolonged drive for Bakhmut exposes Moscow’s “craziness,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a nightly address to the nation this week.
Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko said the civilian population was suffering in more ways with the region becoming an active war zone.“Civilians who remain in the region live in constant fear without heating and electricity,” Kyrylenko said in televised remarks. “Their enemy is not only Russian cannons but also the cold.”
“We’re seeing a situation where the Wagner Group is quite effective at creating terror amongst the local residents but much less effective at actually capturing and holding territory,” he said. At the very best they’re gaining 1 kilometer a week toward Bakhmut, he said.