Fighting raged in and around Bakhmut as Ukraine scoffed at Russian claims it had captured the administrative center of the eastern Ukrainian city, saying Russian forces had raised a victory flag over “some kind of toilet”.
Finland, which shares a 1,300km border with Russia, will join NATO on Tuesday, just over a year after Russia invaded Ukraine, partly in response to what Russia has called the aggressive expansion of the alliance eastward.
The battle for the city and logistics center of Bakhmut is one of the bloodiest of the conflict, with heavy losses on both sides.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner mercenary force that was spearheading the siege, said on Sunday his troops had hoisted a Russian flag over the administration building in the city center, although Ukrainian soldiers still occupied some western positions.
But the Ukrainian military rejected that claim and said fighting was raging around the city council building, as well as in other nearby towns.
“Bakhmut is Ukrainian and they haven’t captured anything and are very far from doing it,” Eastern Military Command spokesman Serhiy Cherevatyi told Reuters.
“They hoisted the flag over some kind of toilet. They arrested who knows what, hung up the rag and said they took the city. Very good, let them think they took it,” Cherevatyi added by telephone.
The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said in an evening statement that 45 enemy attacks had been repulsed in total in the past 24 hours, with Bakhmut as the “epicenter of operations” along with the towns of Avdiivka and Maryinka further south.
Reuters could not verify the reports from the battlefield.
On the edge of a Russian-controlled part of Donetsk province, Bakhmut had a population of 70,000 before Russia invaded Ukraine in February last year.
Russian forces, mired in a war of attrition after a series of setbacks, aim for victory in their winter offensive but have suffered heavy casualties at Bakhmut.
Ukraine’s military commanders said their counteroffensive – supported by newly delivered Western tanks and other equipment – was not far off, but stressed the importance of holding Bakhmut down and inflicting casualties in the meantime.
“The people are ready for the counteroffensive, all we are waiting for are orders and details on which direction we should go – Bakhmut, Soledar or wherever,” said a 35-year-old soldier from a tank brigade near Bakhmut, who he used the name Polyot.
Source: Terra
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