UKRAINE INflictS HEAVY LOSSES ON RUSSIA IN THE DONBASS
by Natalia Zinets
Kyiv – Ukrainian authorities on Friday admitted to suffering heavy casualties in Donbass but said they inflicted even “more colossal” casualties on the Russian army, which made that region of eastern Ukraine its priority.
After the failure of its first offensive towards Kyiv, Russia is concentrating its efforts on capturing all areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk administrative regions, some of which have been controlled by pro-Russian separatists since 2014.
Ukraine has acknowledged the loss of some small towns and villages near the frontlines since the “Battle of Donbass” began last week, but says the slow advance of Russian forces comes at the cost of already higher casualties for those they fought in a have endured month of fighting north of Kyiv.
“We are suffering heavy casualties, but the Russians are even heavier. They are colossal,” said an adviser to the Ukrainian Presidency, Oleksi Arestovych.
The challenge for the Kiev authorities is to resist for as long as possible to allow the arrival at the front of the heavy weapons promised by the West in recent days, particularly by the United States, whose President Joe Biden den Congress on Thursday asked for the release of an unprecedented $33 billion, including $20 billion in military aid.
Faced with the quantitative and qualitative acceleration of Western aid to Ukraine, Moscow in recent days has multiplied threats of “world war”, even a possible nuclear strike, while increasing pressure on European countries to shut off gas to Poland and Bulgaria.
JOURNALIST KILLED IN KIEV
Russia also admitted firing two rockets at buildings in central Kyiv on Thursday, at the end of a meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who earlier visited the towns of Borodyanka, Boutcha and Irpine, where he was had denounced Russian “war crimes”.
A Ukrainian journalist, producer of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, was killed when one of the rockets exploded, ripping up the first two floors of the apartment building where she lived, her Prague employer said on Friday in Czech Republic.
“Russia’s barbarism is incomprehensible,” said Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko, calling on media around the world to “condemn the murder of Vira Hyrych and all other innocent Ukrainians.”
The Russian Defense Ministry said it fired high-precision missiles at a space manufacturing facility.
“Kyiv remains a dangerous place and of course still a target for the Russians. The capital of Ukraine remains their target and they want to occupy it,” said the city’s mayor Vitaly Klitschko while inspecting the damage.
According to the Ukrainian presidency, the Russian army is attacking the front line in the Donetsk region with all means at its disposal: rockets, artillery, airstrikes.
British intelligence reported fierce fighting around the twin cities of Lisichansk and Severodonetsk in the Luhansk region and an attempt by the Russian army to push south from Izium towards Sloviansk.
“Due to strong Ukrainian resistance, Russia’s territorial gains were limited and Russian forces suffered significant casualties,” the UK MoD said.
“SAVED” FROM HELL IN MARIOUPOL
No humanitarian solution has yet been found in Mariupol for the hundreds of civilian refugees who are being held in the fortified basements of the Azovstal Metallurgical Plant, the last bastion of the Ukrainian resistance, accompanied by an unspecified number of Ukrainian militants.
Antonio Guterres said he was ready to help find a solution before Russian missiles hit Kyiv, and the Ukrainian presidency, without further ado, mentioned an evacuation operation for civilians on Friday. All previous attempts have failed.
In the ruins of the city occupied by Russian forces, relief workers began collecting the bodies, and residents told Reuters the horrors of the siege and the incessant bombardment.
“We were hungry and the children cried when the Grads (Russian multiple rocket launchers) exploded next to the house,” says Viktoria Nikolayeva, 54, recounting how she and her family survived by taking refuge in the basement of their home. “We said to ourselves, this is it, this is the end. It was indescribable.”
“It was a massacre,” agrees Vitali Kudassov, 71. “It was terrifying to see the grenades fly over our heads. We can’t survive something like this. And yet here we are,” he says.
According to the Ukrainian authorities, around 100,000 people still live in the port city, about a quarter of the pre-war population.
Some Mariupol residents managed to flee to Ukraine over the weeks, while others were often forcibly taken to Russia, where Moscow portrayed them as victims of Ukrainian bombing, particularly “neo-Nazis” from the Azov regiment.
(Reporting by Natalia Zinets in Kyiv, with contributions by Reuters journalists in Mariupol under Russian occupation, French version Tangi Salaün, edited by Bertrand Boucey)