Ukraine on Monday claimed to have retaken 37 square kilometers in the east and south after a “difficult” week as part of its counter-offensive, while reporting that Russian troops were also on the attack on others. front sectors.
Ukrainian forces launched a large-scale operation in early June to retake territories occupied by Russia, but gains have so far been limited due to a strong Russian defense and a lack of military air force and ammunition. ‘artillery.
“Last week was difficult on the front, but we are making progress. We are moving forward step by step,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky summed up on Telegram.
According to Deputy Defense Minister Ganna Maliar, the Ukrainian army has over the past seven days taken over 28.4 square kilometers in the south and 9 km2 in the east, where it is fighting in particular around the devastated city of Bakhmout .
“The enemy is resisting strongly, a very tough duel is underway,” said Ms. Maliar, as Moscow built defensive lines for months based on trenches and minefields.
On the other side of the front, the Russian army launched attacks in the sectors of Avdiïvka, Mariïnka and Lyman, to which has been added since the end of last week that of Svatové, according to the same source.
In Russia, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu assured him during a briefing on Monday that kyiv had not “achieved its objectives on any axis” since the start of its counter-offensive. He claimed responsibility for the destruction of 16 Western Leopard tanks delivered to Ukraine.
Also reacting for the first time to the rebellion of the Wagner group at the end of June, Mr. Choigou considered that the mutiny had “not affected the operations of the troops” in Ukraine, praising their “loyalty” which made it possible to make it fail.
The Russian security services, the FSB, for their part announced that they had arrested a man accused of a bomb attempt on the life of Sergei Aksionov, a leader installed by Moscow in Crimea, a Ukrainian peninsula annexed in 2014.
According to the FSB, this man was “recruited by officers of the SBU”, the Ukrainian security services, and had undergone “subversive intelligence training in Ukraine, including explosives”.
Blamed on kyiv by Moscow, several attacks that have killed or injured Russian occupation officials in Ukraine have taken place since the start of the Russian invasion in 2022.
Elsewhere in Ukraine, one person was killed and 15 others injured in a Russian drone attack that hit an apartment building in Sumy (northeast), emergency services said.
While analysts believe Ukraine has yet to launch the bulk of its newly trained and Western-armed forces into its counteroffensive, the apparent slowness of the operation, especially compared to previous advances in the North -East and South last year, seems to have aroused tensions.
Ukrainian army commander Valery Zaluzhny was annoyed in an interview with the Washington Post on Friday by the impatience expressed by some, including in the West, to see progress on the ground against Russian forces.
“It swells me,” he said, urging to speed up deliveries of the F-16 warplanes that have been promised by the West.
Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday accused kyiv’s western partners of “dragging their feet” on training Ukrainian airmen to fly F-16s.
US Chief of Staff Mark Milley, from Washington, replied that the United States and its allies are doing their best to send what Ukraine needs.
The head of NATO’s military committee, Admiral Rob Bauer, said on Monday that it was “not surprising” that the Ukrainian counter-offensive was not progressing quickly, given the “huge defensive obstacles” Russians which should encourage “caution”.
These developments on the ground come a week before an important NATO meeting in Vilnius, Lithuania, during which the allies must formulate a common position on the security guarantees they are ready to grant to Ukraine, failing of a promise of accelerated membership.
Volodymyr Zelensky demanded on Saturday that his country receive a “very clear and intelligible signal”, an “invitation” according to which his country can “become a full member of NATO after the war”.
On the judicial level, an international office responsible for investigating the “crime of aggression” against Ukraine opened Monday in The Hague in the Netherlands, a possible first step towards the creation of a special tribunal intended to bring justice to the Russian leadership for initiating this war.
03/07/2023 17:39:37 – Kiev (Ukraine) (AFP) © 2023 AFP