Pro-Russian separatists in Donetsk announced today that they have captured the city of Lyman, a key city in eastern Ukraine, where Moscow is gaining ground after more than three months of offensive.
The General Staff of the pro-Russian separatist militias in Donetsk stated on its Telegram account that with the support of military units from the separatist Luhansk region and the armed forces of Moscow, “gain full control” of Lyman.
At the moment, the Russian military has not released any information, and AFP could not independently verify the news.
Unable to take Kyiv and Kharkiv, Moscow focused its efforts on the complete conquest of the Donbass, a mining region that included the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
Lyman is an important rail hub of Kramatorsk, the capital of the Ukrainian-held Donetsk region, which was briefly taken over by pro-Russian separatists in 2014, northeast of Slaviansk.
The conquest of Lyman would allow Russian troops to overcome the final hurdle to advance further east into Slaviansk and Kramatorsk in a maneuver to encircle Severodonetsk and Lysychansk.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of committing “genocide” in Severodonetsk, which dropped bombs in Donbass.
In his daily speech this morning, Zelensky said that “the current offensive of the invaders in Donbass could make the region uninhabitable”, accusing Russia of wanting to “burn” many cities in the region.
He insisted that Russia had carried out the “deportation” and “mass killing of civilians”. All this is a clear policy of genocide,” he said.
When launching its invasion on February 24, Moscow used, among other reasons, an alleged “genocide” against the Russian-speaking population of Donbass, which has been the scene of a war between Kyiv and pro-Russian separatists since 2014.
In April, the word “genocide” was already being used against Russia by the Ukrainian Parliament or by international leaders such as the American Joe Biden or the British Boris Johnson.
siege attempt
The Russian army is also bombing Severodonetsk, which its governor has warned may suffer the same fate as Mariupol, a major southeastern port devastated after weeks of siege.
At least five civilians were killed in the area within 24 hours, Governor Sergei Gaidai said on Friday: four in Severodonetsk and one in Komychuvakha, 50 kilometers away.
“The Russians are constantly bombing residential areas,” Gaidai told Telegram.
“We believe that Russian forces have captured most of the northeast of Severodonetsk, but there is still war,” a senior US Department of Defense official said.
Alexander Striuk, head of Severodonetsk’s civil and military administration, said the city, which had a population of 100,000 before the war, still has between 12,000 and 13,000 people.
“About 60% of Severodonetsk’s housing stock has been destroyed. 85-90% of city buildings are damaged and will need major restoration,” he told Ukrainian media.
An official in Dnipro, an industrial city in eastern Ukraine, announced on Friday that “a dozen” were killed and about 30 wounded in the Russian bombardment of a military camp.
The bombings in Kharkov
Further north, air raid sirens sounded again on Friday in Kharkiv. Nine people were killed and 19 injured, including a five-month-old baby and her father, in a bombing the previous day, according to President Zelensky.
According to an AFP journalist, the missiles landed in a residential area of the Pavlové Polé neighborhood, where a young man was killed and four injured were taken to hospital, one of them missing an arm and a leg.
Russia had abandoned its offensive in this city to concentrate its troops in eastern and southern Ukraine, and its population was trying to make a difficult return to normal by continuing its metro service.
But Moscow forces still hold their positions east of Kharkov as the Ukrainians dig trenches around the city and set up cinder blocks, sandbags and checkpoints in case of a further attack.
Ukraine once again demanded more weapons from Western countries. “Some partners are refraining from supplying the necessary weapons for fear of escalation. Is the tension really? Russia is already using the heaviest non-nuclear weapons, burning people alive. Maybe (…) it’s time to give us the MLRS multiple rockets),” Ukrainian presidential adviser Mikhailo Podoliak tweeted.
The Kremlin on Thursday rejected an Italian peace plan, which analysts say wants to consolidate its gains in southern and eastern Ukraine before any negotiated settlement.
The proposal called for a UN-supervised ceasefire and troop withdrawal, Ukraine’s entry into the EU, not NATO, and the granting of autonomy status to Donbass and Crimea under Ukrainian sovereignty.
The war between Ukraine and Russia, the main grain exporters responsible for one-third of the world’s wheat production, is affecting the global food market and raising fears of food shortages.
The ports of the former Soviet republic are congested and thousands of tons of grain are piled up in warehouses.
According to US General Chris Cavoli, Germany offered to build a “railway bridge” with Ukraine to transport this goods.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has offered to help “solve the food crisis” in exchange for lifting Western sanctions on Moscow.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby stated that the US rejected the offer and said, “Now they use economic tools as weapons. They turn food into weapons.”
source: Noticias
