Russia taking ‘operational pause’ in Ukraine, analysts say
KYIV, Ukraine — Foreign analysts say Russia may be temporar- ily easing its offensive in eastern Ukraine as the Russian military attempts to reassemble its forces for a significant — and what it hopes could prove decisive — new assault on its neighbor. Russian President Vladimir Putin warned menacingly on Thursday that his forces “haven’t even started” to fight.
Russian forces made no claimed or assessed territorial gains in Ukraine on Wednesday “for the first time in 133 days of war,” according to the Institute for the Study of War. The Washington-based think tank suggested Moscow may be taking an “operational pause,” but said that does not entail “the complete cessation of active hostilities.”
“Russian forces will likely confine themselves to relatively smallscale offensive actions as they attempt to set conditions for more significant offensive operations” and rebuild the necessary combat power, the institute said.
Russia’s Defense Ministry seemed to confirm that assessment, saying in a statement Thursday that Russian soldiers had been given time to rest.
“The units that performed combat missions … are taking measures to recover their combat capabilities. The servicemen are given the opportunity to rest, receive letters and parcels from home,” read the statement, quoted by Russian state news agency Tass.
Putin warned Kyiv it should quickly accept Moscow’s terms to end the fighting or brace for the worst.
“Everybody should know that largely speaking, we haven’t even yet started anything in earnest,” he said in a menacing note.
Shelling continued in Ukraine’s east, where at least nine civilians were killed and six wounded in the past 24 hours, Ukrainian officials said early Thursday.
Ukraine’s presidential office said in its morning update that cities and villages in seven of the country’s regions were shelled in the past day. Most of the civilian deaths occurred in Donetsk province, where fighting is ongoing. Seven civilians were killed there, including a child, the presidential office said.
Later Thursday, a missile hit a residential area in the Donetsk city of Kramatorsk, killing one civilian and injuring at least six, officials said.
Volodymyr, 66, a resident who declined to provide his full name, sat in his overturned apartment, covered in blood.
“I was just sitting and drinking tea, and then there was an explosion,” he told the Associated Press. “You can see the result of it.”
Asked if he felt safe staying in his apartment building block, he responded: “Is it safe right now anywhere in Ukraine? It all just happened in one moment, and that was it.”
Three people were killed and at least two wounded in what appeared to be a rocket attack on a residential neighborhood of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city.
Earlier in the day, a boarding school was hit in Kharkiv but no one was injured. In separate attacks, the Ukrainian regional administration reported that three people across the Kharkiv region had been wounded by shelling.
The Kharkiv region, which lies along the border with Russia, is under daily shelling, and at least five civilians were killed there since Wednesday.
In all, 10 cities and villages came under shelling in Donetsk, and 35 buildings were destroyed, including a school, a vocational college and a hospital, officials said.