Russia said on Thursday that it was blocking Ukrainian forces in Bakhmout and preventing any reinforcements from entering it, hinting that it was regarding to take this eastern city, the epicenter of fighting since last summer.
In a comment to AFP, the Ukrainian army immediately denied this, claiming to continue to supply its troops in Bakhmout and inflict daily “crazy losses” to the enemy. AFP might not verify these statements from an independent source.
The leader of the Russian paramilitary group Wagner, Evguéni Prigojine, whose fighters are on the front line in Bakhmout, told him that it was still “premature” to speak of a complete encirclement.
A city of some 70,000 inhabitants before the invasion, the city is now almost completely destroyed. kyiv assures that its resistance for months in Bakhmout has made it possible to fix a place on the front and destroy a large number of Russian troops.