Rapidly advancing Ukrainian troops on Friday closed off the main railroad feeding Russian forces to the east, after the collapse of part of Russia’s front line caused the most dramatic change since the first weeks of the war.
In a video speech, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said the troops “saved dozens of settlements” last week and recaptured more than 1,000 square kilometers in the Kharkov region in the east and the Kherson region in the south.
Zelenskiy released a video in which he says Ukrainian soldiers have captured the town of Balakliia, which lies along a front stretching south of Ukraine’s second largest city, Kharkov.
The Ukrainian army said it had advanced about 50 km on this front after an attack that appeared to have taken the Russians by surprise.
It was the first such lightning advance reported by both sides in months, in a war mostly characterized by relentless front-line battles, since Russia abandoned its disastrous offensive on the capital, Kiev, in March.
About 24 hours after Ukraine announced its advance on the Kharkov front, Russia has yet to make a public statement. The Kremlin declined to comment on Friday and put questions to the Russian military.
Ukraine did not allow independent journalists to enter the region to verify the extent of their advances. But Ukrainian news sites showed pictures of soldiers celebrating in armored vehicles as they passed signs with the names of cities previously controlled by Russia and the names of Russian forces surrendering on the roadside.
“We’re seeing success in Kherson right now, we’re seeing some success in Kharkiv, and that’s very, very encouraging,” US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said at a press conference with his Czech counterpart in Prague.
The Institute for War Studies said that Ukrainians are now just 15km from Kupiansk, an important junction for the main railway lines that Moscow has long relied on to power the eastern battlefields.
source: Noticias
