Russia strikes back at recaptured zone
KRAMATORSK: Ukraine’s forces have regained yet more ground and retaken an area seven times the size of Kyiv this month, Kyiv said on Monday (local time), as Russia responded with strikes on some recaptured areas.
The territorial shifts marked one of Russia’s biggest reversals since its troops were turned back from Kyiv in the earliest days of the nearly seven months of fighting, yet Moscow signalled it was no closer to agreeing to a negotiated peace.
The retreat of Russian troops in recent days has drawn relieved locals into bomb-cratered streets, including on Sunday in the damaged town of Izyum.
“It’s not enough to say I’m happy. I just don’t have enough words to express myself,” said Yuriy Kurochka, 64.
Yet by Monday, Moscow had announced air, rocket and artillery attacks on reclaimed areas in the Kharkiv region, a day after Kyiv said Russian strikes on electricity infrastructure had caused power failures.
The retaliatory fire came as Ukraine said forces had retaken more than 20 additional settlements, claiming “Russian troops are hastily abandoning their positions and fleeing”.
Kyiv had already announced the recapture of Izyum in the country’s east, while President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Monday that Ukraine’s forces had retaken a total of 6000sq km from Russia in September.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Ukrainian forces had made “significant progress”, due to their resilience as well as US support.
“It’s too early to tell exactly where this is going. The Russians maintain very significant forces in Ukraine as well as equipment and arms and munitions. They continue to use it indiscriminately against not just the Ukrainian armed forces but civilians and civilian infrastructure as we’ve seen,” Mr Blinken said.
A US think tank, the Institute for the Study of War, tweeted: “Ukraine has turned the tide in its favour, but the current counter-offensive will not end the war.”
Moscow conceded having lost territory – which experts saw as a serious blow to its war ambitions – but Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said there was no prospect of negotiations.
“The special military operation continues and will continue until the objectives that were originally set are achieved,” he added, using Russia’s terminology for the internationally condemned war.
The Russian strikes hit 15 locations on Sunday, from Kramatorsk in the east to Mykolaiv in the south and Dnipro in between, Ukraine’s military said.
Ukraine had already lost all power from the Russiancontrolled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, threatened by shelling since February’s invasion.
The country’s nuclear energy agency said the final reactor at the plant – Europe’s largest nuclear power station – had been shut off as a safety measure.
Kyiv and Moscow have shown “signs that they are interested” in creating a security zone around the plant, the UN said on Monday.
“What we need here really is Ukraine and Russia to agree on a very simple principle of not attacking or not shelling the plant,” the IAEA’s Rafael Grossi said.