Ukraine-Russia War Files While Russia has ruled out remobilizing to strengthen its army, Ukraine is indicating it is retreating on the eastern front but advancing on the south, and is urging its allies to speed up aid supplies.
The announcement should be viewed with the usual doubts about official Russian statements. A senior Russian army official, also a deputy, on Monday, July 3, dismissed any renewed mobilization of civilians to reinforce his troops following the withdrawal of men from the Wagner paramilitary group from Ukraine. On the front lines, Kiev reported “fierce fighting” everywhere, acknowledging that there had been a retreat in four areas of the front line in the east and that progress in the south was assured.
“The President of the Russian Federation (Vladimir Putin) said clearly, understandably and specifically that there will be no further mobilization,” Andrei Kartapolov told the state news agency TASS on Monday. The Chairman of the Defense Committee of the Duma, the lower house of the Russian Parliament. “Today and in the near future there is no need for mobilization,” he added, stating that in the medium and long term “there is absolutely no risk of reduced combat potential” and that Moscow has manpower within the Russian Armed Forces to replace them.
On June 13, a few days before the paramilitary group’s mutiny collapsed, Vladimir Putin himself rejected the possibility of renewed mobilization. According to the Kremlin website, he told reporters: “Today there is no such need.” After the failure of the mutiny, Evgueni Prigoyine, the leader of the Wagner group, agreed to exile in Belarus thanks to the mediation of Minsk, an ally of Moscow to go.
According to this agreement, Wagner’s fighters have the choice of going to Belarus, returning to civilian life, or joining the regular Russian army. Evgueni Prigoyine asserted that his uprising was not intended to overthrow power, but to save Wagner from being dismantled by the Russian General Staff, whom he accuses of incompetence in the conflict in Ukraine.
“There’s fierce fighting going on”
According to Kiev, Russian forces advanced in four areas of the front line in the east on Sunday (July 2), but Ukraine gave assurances that its troops were advancing in the south about a month after the start of their counteroffensive. “The enemy is concentrating its forces in the Lyman, Bakhmout, Avdiivka and Mariinka areas, fierce fighting is taking place,” Ukraine’s General Staff said in its regular report on Monday. During the night from Sunday to Monday Moscow attacked Ukraine with Iranian Shahed missiles and drones, the same source added, without providing any information on damage or casualties.
The Ukrainian army retook 37 square kilometers in the east and south of the country from Russian forces within a week, Deputy Defense Minister Ganna Maliar said on Monday. In the south, “the liberated areas have grown by 28.4 square kilometers,” bringing the total area recovered in that area since the counteroffensive began to 158 square kilometers, she said. To the east, Kiev’s gains reached just 9 km², she added. “There are fierce battles everywhere”, “the situation is quite difficult,” Ganna Maliar wrote on Telegram the day before.
Around 60 people, including writer Victoria Amelina, were seriously injured in a Russian attack on a restaurant in Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine last Tuesday. The Ukrainian author died on Saturday, the Ukrainian branch of the international NGO Pen Club said, bringing the death toll from the bombing to 13. Ukrainian troops “are continuously and tirelessly working to create the conditions for the fastest advance possible,” Ganna Maliar wrote on Sunday.
Ukraine says it is continuing its counter-offensive launched about a month ago that has so far yielded no decisive progress, and is urging its western allies to speed up promised military aid as a NATO summit in Vilnius looms. US Chief of Staff Mark Milley from Washington replied that the United States and its allies are doing their best to send Ukraine what it needs.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy criticized Kiev’s western partners for the speed with which the training of Ukrainian pilots, who are used to Soviet MiGs and Sukhoi, to pilot F-16s is being implemented on Saturday at the reception of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. “There is no schedule for training missions. I think some partners hesitate. Why do they do that? I don’t know,” he said.
grain deal in question
With regard to grain exports, the Russian ambassador to the United Nations said he saw no “reasons” for extending the agreement, which expires in July and allows Ukrainian exports despite the conflict.
For Gennady Gatilov, the agreement reached in July 2022 has turned away from its humanitarian goals and has become a “commercial project” that mainly supplies “high-income countries,” he said in an interview with Russian media outlet Izvestia published on Monday. And the corridors “are regularly used by Ukrainians to launch military drones,” the diplomat added. “What we see today gives us no reason to accept the continuation of the status quo.”
On June 21, Kyiv said it was not “very optimistic” about a possible renewal of the deal after Moscow again threatened to withdraw because certain clauses had not been respected.