Ukraine and Russia exchanged jokes on Wednesday over the extent to which Kremlin forces control the town of Bakhmut, which has been the focal point of Moscow’s bid to push into eastern Ukraine for months.
The Ukrainian military said it controlled “considerably” more than 20% of the city. Russian businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin’s claim that his group of Wagner mercenaries had seized more than 80% of Bakhmut is not true, they said.
The Russian Defense Ministry responded that Wagner’s forces had captured city blocks. And Russian forces, he said, attacked Ukrainian army reserves trying to break through.
After withdrawing from an attempted advance on Kiev last year in what Moscow calls a “special military operation,” the Russian military has mainly focused on capturing Bakhmut as a push to advance on cities further west in the region of Donetsk.
But his gains were gradual over many months. Prigozhin made several premature announcements relating to Wagner’s position to Bakhmut.
Serhiy Cherevatyi, a spokesman for Ukraine’s Eastern Military Command, rejected Prigozhin’s latest 80% claim in a commentary to Reuters.
“I just got in touch with the commander of one of the brigades defending the city. And I can confidently say that the Ukrainian Defensive Forces control a considerably larger percentage of Bakhmut’s territory,” he said.
Analyst Konrad Muzyka, director of the Rochan military consultancy in Poland, said his calculations confirmed the Russian claim by 80%. “The big question is whether the current Russian pace can be maintained,” he said on Twitter.
Ukrainian forces held out for months in Bakhmut, where the fiercest fighting of the February 2022 invasion of Moscow killed thousands of soldiers and was nicknamed the “meat grinder”.
Prigozhin said on Tuesday his forces controlled most of Bakhmut, including the administrative center, factories, warehouses and municipal buildings.
“Prigozhin needs to show at least some kind of victory in the city, which they have been trying to achieve for nine consecutive months and that is why he is making these statements,” Cherevatyi said.
The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said there had been no let-up in Russian attempts to take the city, with Ukrainian troops repelling nearly 18 attacks. Russian forces, he said, had tried unsuccessfully to move into two villages to the northwest.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy praised the efforts of forces defending Bakhmut and other areas to the east, but made no specific reference to the situation in the city.
Source: Terra
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