Yellow and blue, the Ukrainian flag flies above the door of the cultural center of the village of Blagodatné in the south-east of the country, recently liberated by Kiev forces. Inside, the dead soldiers are Russians.
A week after the launch of its counter-offensive against the Russian occupation troops, the Ukrainian army retook several localities on the Mokri Ialy river.
kyiv’s forces are advancing, and even the Russian army has confirmed that its positions at Urozhaine, two kilometers south of Blagodatne, have been attacked.
Led by the so-called 68th “hunter” brigade, the push south into this valley is the most concrete sign of Ukrainian progress since the start of the long-awaited counter-offensive.
Ukrainian authorities have reported “strong resistance” from Russian troops, although Kyiv forces have yet to reach the main Russian fortified line of defence.
“When I arrive in the center of Donetsk, I will say that our mission is partly accomplished,” said a senior officer of the 68th, nom de guerre “Lermontov”, like the Russian romantic poet of the 19th century, told AFP.
“I’ve been dreaming of Donetsk since 2014, it’s the heart of Donbass,” he adds, juggling a walkie-talkie and a smartphone to place orders.
Blagodatné, a small farming community, is 90 kilometers west of Donetsk, the “capital” of the Donbass, a vast coal-mining region partially held since 2014 by pro-Russian separatists and the Moscow forces supporting them.
The Ukrainian offensive aims to retake all territories seized by Russia both in 2014 and since the invasion launched in February 2022, but it has only just begun.
Ukraine raised its flag in Blagodatné on June 11, but soldiers there told AFP that removing the last pockets of resistance took two more days.
Some areas have not yet been cleared and there are still dead bodies of Russian soldiers and a small number of Ukrainian civilians.
At least four Russian soldiers died inside the cultural center, marked by artillery fire.
They lie where they fell, among shards of broken glass and Kalashnikov casings.
One of the dead has his skull destroyed from the bottom up, as if he had been shot under the jaw, possibly a suicide in the last desperate stages of the battle.
Another body lies in a shell-damaged library, beneath a portrait of 19th-century Ukrainian poet and artist Taras Shevchenko, a symbol of national awakening.
In the central hall is a half-empty crate of unused 5.45mm rounds.
If the Russians didn’t die long ago, the center seems long abandoned. In the concert hall with the torn roof, swallows nest in the framework and fly through the broken windows.
The 68th Brigade is not among the new units that received Western training and full NATO armament in preparation for the Ukrainian counteroffensive.
Created in April 2022, shortly after the start of the Russian invasion, to specialize in combat in forests and wetlands, the unit has however received American-made MRAP armored vehicles.
Equipped with powerful 12.7 millimeter caliber machine guns in the roof turret, these battle-scarred MaxxPro vehicles can transport soldiers to the front despite continued Russian bombardment.
For the military nurse in the name of the war “Vinni” it is what pushed his unit into combat.
“We wouldn’t have made it if we only had our old vehicles,” he told AFP.
“Anyway you look at it, this counter-offensive is necessary. If not us, then who will do it?” he continued before adding: “We must destroy them and drive them out of our land”.
16/06/2023 21:56:15 – Charitable (Ukraine) (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
