At the same time in Oslo, the Nobel Peace Prize rewarded imprisoned Belarusian activist Ales Beliatski, Russian NGO Memorial and Ukrainian Center for Civil Libertiesa highly symbolic prize in the midst of the war in Ukraine.
On the ground, a sign of the confidence won by the Ukrainians following the success of their counter-offensive, Defense Minister Oleksiï Reznikov promised to to guarantee life, security and justice
to Russian soldiers who choose to surrender.
You can still save Russia from tragedy and the Russian army from humiliation
he launched, while the defeats pushed Russian President Vladimir Putin to mobilize several hundred thousand people in the army.
Moscow, for its part, announced that it had made its first gains – three villages in eastern Ukraine – following losing thousands of square kilometers of territory on several fronts in recent weeks.
According to pro-Russian separatists fighting alongside troops from Moscow, the villages of Otradivka, Vessela Dolyna and Zaitseve are now under Russian control. The Russian Ministry of Defense had already announced the capture of Zaitseve the day before in its daily report.
These three villages are located south of the city of Bakhmout which is under Ukrainian control. The Russian army has been trying to take the area for months, so far without success.
Present in Bakhmout on Friday, AFP journalists heard the sound of heavy artillery fire and multiple rocket launchers in the center of this city, which had 70,000 inhabitants before the war.
Occasional bursts of machine gun fire were also audible. A civilian volunteer from the humanitarian group Vostok SOS, Edouard Skorik, 29, told AFP that street fights
took place near his house, on the other side of the Bakhmuta river.
To the south of the city, towards the villages captured by the Russians, columns of black smoke rose from the explosions of shells, startling and sometimes plunging civilians to the ground.
Ukrainian forces also reported gains on Friday: the village of Grekivka, in the Lugansk region (east), according to Governor Serguiï Gaïdaï.
Ukrainian forces claim territorial gains in both the south and northeast of the country.
Photo : afp via getty images / DIMITAR DILKOFF
In the occupied region of Kherson (south), at least five civilians were killed and five injured by a Ukrainian strike that hit a bus of civilians on their way to work crossing a bridge, according to pro-Russian official Kirill Stremoussov.
kyiv has targeted bridges in this region on multiple occasions in order to disrupt the logistical supply of Russian forces.
The Ukrainian presidency reported a new Russian strike on the region of Zaporizhia (south), for the second consecutive day, injuring one person. Infrastructure was destroyed in two districts. The occupier used drones for the first time
she said.
The day before, 11 people had been killed in Russian strikes on Zaporizhia, according to the Ukrainian emergency services.
The leader of the pro-Russian separatists in the Donetsk region (east), Denis Pushilin, noted the situation The hardest
near Lyman, a railway junction recently taken over by Ukrainian forces, where Russian troops narrowly escaped encirclement.
According to him, the latter are fortifying a new line of defense near the Kreminna, further east than the Ukrainian forces. test day and night
.
I think we have every chance to accumulate forces and begin to liberate territories with new reserves
he added, announcing the dispatch of reinforcements.
Russia claimed last week the annexation of four regions it controls at least in part in Ukraine, following referendums
denounced by the UN, kyiv and its Western allies.
As for the nuclear threat, it is going crescendo.
After the Vladimir Putin’s threats to use nuclear weapons to defend the territories that the Kremlin considers Russian, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke on Thursday of preemptive strikes
once morest Russia.
If the Ukrainian presidency quickly backtracked by claiming that Mr Zelensky was talking regarding sanctions
preventive measures and not strikes, Russian officials castigated his remarks.
The Kremlin denounced a call to start a new world war
and the head of Russian diplomacy, Sergei Lavrov, considered that such statements justified the Russian invasion.
US President Joe Biden has warned him of the risk ofapocalypse
for the first time since the Cold War.
