Ukrainian city Slovensk under ‘massive shelling’

A city on Moscow’s offensive line has been continuously bombed, its mayor said, a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin declared victory over a province in eastern Ukraine crucial to its wartime goals.

Mayor Vadim Lyakh said in a Facebook post that “massive shelling” hit Sloveniask, which had a population of about 107,000 people before Russia invaded Ukraine more than four months ago.

The barrage targeting Slovensk underscores concerns that Russian forces are being positioned further into Ukraine’s Donbas region, a largely Russian-speaking industrial zone where the country’s most experienced soldiers are concentrated.

Slovensk used rockets and artillery fire during Russia’s war with Ukraine, but bombing has increased in recent days after Moscow captured the last major city in neighboring Luhansk province, Liak said.

The Ukrainian military withdrew from the city of Lysichansk on Sunday to prevent them from being surrounded.

The Russian defense minister and Putin said the subsequent occupation of the city gave Moscow control of all areas of Luhansk, one of the two provinces that make up the Donbass.

The question now is whether Russia can muster enough force to complete the occupation of Donbass by occupying Donetsk province.

Putin acknowledged on Monday that Russian troops fighting in Luhansk need to “take a break and strengthen their combat capabilities.”

Shoigu, however, said Moscow’s “main priorities” at the moment were “protecting the lives and health of troops” and “eliminating threats to the safety of civilians”.

When the Russian president ordered the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, his stated goal was to defend the people of Donbass from what Kyiv called aggression, as well as the “demilitarization” and “denazification” of Ukraine.

Pro-Russian separatists fought Ukrainian troops and controlled much of the Donbass for eight years. Before the invasion, Mr Putin acknowledged the independence of the region’s two self-proclaimed separatist republics.

He also tried to describe the tactics of the Ukrainian army and government as similar to those of Nazi Germany, but no evidence emerged.

The Ukrainian military general staff said Russian troops had also shelled several Donetsk towns and villages around Slovensk in the past day, but were shot as they tried to advance towards a town about 12 miles north of the city. retreat.

South of the city, Russian troops are trying to advance towards two other towns and shelling areas near Kramatorsk.

Meanwhile, Moscow officials in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region announced the formation of a new regional government there, with a former Russian official at the helm.

Sergey Yeliseyev, head of the new Moscow-backed government in Kherson, is a former deputy prime minister in Russia’s western enclave of Kaliningrad and worked for Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), according to media reports.

It’s unclear what the “military-civil government” that the Kremlin had set up earlier would look like. Government head Vladimir Saldo said in a telegram statement that the new government “is not an interim government, not an army, not some kind of interim government, but a proper governing body”.

“The fact that not only Kherson residents, but also Russian officials are part of this government, is a clear indication of the future direction of the Kherson region,” he said.

“This direction is Russia.”