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Russian forces now control Severodonestsk, but Zelensky vows Ukraine will recapture the lost cities

Russian forces took full control of the eastern Ukrainian city of Severodonetsk on Saturday, confirming that Kyiv’s biggest battleground has been defeated in more than a month, after weeks of some bloody fighting. most of the war.

The fall of Severodonetsk – once home to more than 100,000 people, now a wasteland – is Russia’s biggest victory since capturing the port of Mariupol last month. It changed the battlefield in eastern Ukraine after weeks of Moscow’s massive fire advantage yielding only slow results.

Russia now hopes to pressurize and capture more land on the opposite bank, while Ukraine hopes that the price Moscow will pay to capture the ruins of this small city will make Russian forces vulnerable to a counterattack. .

Kyiv’s Independence Monument overlooking Maidan Square is seen on Saturday, four months from the day Russian forces crossed the border with Ukraine and began a wide-scale invasion. (Nariman El-Mofty / The Associated Press)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced in a video speech that Ukraine will regain lost cities, including Severodonetsk. But acknowledging the emotional toll of the war, he said “we don’t know how long it will last, how many more blows, losses and efforts will be needed before we see victory on our side.” before.”

Severodonetsk Mayor Oleksandr Stryuk said on national television that the city was “currently completely occupied by Russia.”

“They’re trying to establish their own order; as far as I know, they’ve assigned some sort of commander.”

Kyrylo Budanov, Ukraine’s director of military intelligence, told Reuters that Ukraine was carrying out “a tactical regrouping” by withdrawing its forces from Severodonetsk.

“Russia is using a tactic … that it used in Mariupol: wiping the city off the face of the earth,” Budanov said. “Given the conditions, it is no longer possible to organize the defense in the rubble and open ground. Therefore, the Ukrainian forces will be on their way to higher ground to continue their operations. defense.”

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Ukrainian forces appear set to withdraw from Severodonetsk, while NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg warned again that Russia’s war in Ukraine could drag on for ‘years’. This is a summary of the war in Ukraine from June 18 to June 24.

“As a result of successful offensive operations,” Russian forces have established full control over Severodonetsk and the nearby town of Borivske, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted representatives of pro-Russian separatist fighters as saying that Russian and pro-Russian forces had entered Lysychansk and fighting was taking place in urban areas there.

As Europe’s largest land conflict since World War II entered its fifth month, Russian missiles also rained down on western, northern and southern regions of the country.

The head of the local government said at least three people were killed and others may be buried in the rubble in the town of Sarny, about 300 kilometers west of Kyiv, after a missile hit a car wash and an auto repair facility.

G7 leaders are expected to show lasting support for Ukraine and discuss ways to tighten ties with Russia at a three-day summit in Germany that begins on Sunday. A source familiar with the matter told Reuters that the leaders would agree on a new ban on gold imports from Russia.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who will participate, said he was concerned Ukraine could face pressure to agree a peace deal, and that the consequences of Putin’s continued action in Ukraine would be dangerous. for international security.

Lysychansk ‘was a horror,’ evacuees say

In the Ukrainian town of Donbas, Pokrovsk, Elena, an elderly woman in a wheelchair from Lysychansk, was among dozens of evacuees arriving by bus from frontline areas.

“Lysychansk, it was a horror, last week. Yesterday we couldn’t take it any longer,” she said. “I told my husband if I died, bury me behind the house.”

A resident in Donetsk, Ukraine, carries a cat in a van carrying pets and various belongings, while leaving a damaged house on Saturday. (Alexander Ermochenko / Reuters)

Russian President Vladimir Putin dispatched tens of thousands of troops to the border on February 24, sparking a conflict that has left thousands dead and millions disabled. It has also triggered an energy and food crisis that is rocking the global economy.

Since Russian forces were defeated in an attack on the capital Kyiv in March, they have shifted their focus to Donbas, an eastern region that includes the Luhansk and Donetsk provinces. Severodonetsk and Lysychansk were the last major Ukrainian fortresses in Luhansk.

A view of a damaged building in Donetsk, Ukraine, as seen on Saturday. (Alexander Ermochenko / Reuters)

The Russians have crossed the river in force in recent days and are moving towards Lysychansk, threatening to encircle Ukrainians in the area.

Russia’s capture of Severodonetsk can be seen as a vindication of the transition from an initial, failed “lightning war” effort to a relentless, massive artillery attack in the east.

Moscow says Luhansk and Donetsk, which have supported uprisings since 2014, are independent states. It demanded that Ukraine cede all the territories of the two provinces to the separatist government.

Ukrainian officials never hoped to keep Severodonetsk indefinitely, but they hoped to offer a price high enough to exhaust the Russian military.

Missile attacks across the country

Ukraine’s top general, Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, wrote on the Telegram app on Saturday that the US-supplied High Mobility Artillery Missile System, or HIMARS, has now been deployed and attacked the targets. consumed in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.

Asked about a potential counter-offensive in the south, Budanov said Ukraine would start to see results “from August”.

Russian missiles also struck elsewhere during the night. “48 cruise missiles. At night. All over Ukraine,” Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said on Twitter. “Russia is still trying to intimidate Ukraine, causing panic.”

Ukrainian soldiers are seen in Kostanynivka, in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, on Saturday – four months after Russia began its wide-ranging invasion of its neighbour. (Marko Djurica / Reuters)

The governor of the Lviv region in western Ukraine said six missiles were fired from the Black Sea at a base near the border with Poland. Four hit the target, but two were destroyed.

The war has had a huge impact on the global economy and European security arrangements, raising the prices of gas, oil and food, pushing the EU to reduce its heavy reliance on Russian energy and led Finland and Sweden to seek NATO membership.

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