KYIV, UKRAINE (AFP) – Russian advances appear to have stalled in Moscow’s campaign to capture the city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine.
The Washington-based War Research Institute said it had no confirmation of Russian military advances in Bakhmut. Russian forces and units of the Kremlin-controlled Wagner Group paramilitary group continued to launch ground attacks in the city, but there was no evidence they were able to advance, he said late Saturday, the ISW said.
The report quoted a spokesman for the Ukrainian Army Eastern Group Serhiy Cherevaty as saying that fighting in the Bakhmut area was more intense this week than in previous weeks. Cherevaty said he had 23 clashes in the city in the last 24 hours. The ISW report follows claims earlier this week that Russia made headway. Britain’s defense ministry said on Saturday that militia forces from the Kremlin-controlled Wagner his group had occupied much of eastern Bakhmut, with the river running through the town now marking a fighting frontline. This assessment emphasized that a Russian offensive would be difficult to sustain without significant personnel losses.
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The mining town of Bakhmut, located in Donetsk Oblast in eastern Ukraine, is one of his four regions of Ukraine illegally annexed by Russian President Vladimir Putin last year. Russian forces launched an operation to recapture Bakhmut in August, with staggering casualties on both sides. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has vowed not to back down.
In its latest report on Sunday, the UK Defense Ministry said Sunday that the impact of the heavy casualties Russia continues to suffer in Ukraine varies widely across the country. According to the ministry’s information update, the major cities of Moscow and St. Petersburg remain “relatively intact”, especially among members of the Russian elite. The mortality rate it accounts for is “30 to 40 times higher than in Moscow”.
The report highlights that minorities are often hit hardest. In the southern Astrakhan region, for example, about “75% of casualties come from the minority Kazakh and Tartar populations.”
Russia’s mounting casualties are reflected in a loss of government control over the country’s information sphere, ISW said. The think tank said that Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova confirmed “infighting in the Kremlin inner circle” and that the Kremlin has effectively ceded control over the country’s information space, with Putin unable to readily regain control.
The ISW sees Zakharova’s comments, made at a forum on the “practical and technological aspects of information and cognitive warfare in modern realities” in Moscow, as “noteworthy” and in line with the think tank’s long standing assessments about the “deteriorating Kremlin regime and information space control dynamics.”
In a separate statement, Zakharova said Sunday that the next round of talks regarding extending the Black Sea grain deal will be held on Monday in Geneva. The meeting will see a Russian delegation meet with top U.N. officials before the deal’s latest extension that expires on March 18.
The wartime agreement that unblocked grain shipments from Ukraine and helped temper rising global food prices was last extended by four months in November. The agreement, signed separately by Ukraine and Russia with the United Nations and Turkey on July 22, establishes safe Black Sea routes and inspection procedures to address concerns that cargo ships may be carrying arms. bottom.
