Ukraine hails gains in Bakhmut as Zelenskiy wins more weapons in Europe

KYIV/LONDON, May 15 (Reuters) – Ukraine on Monday hailed its first substantial battlefield gains in six months as President Volodymyr Zelenskiy won commitments for new long-range drones in Britain to add to a haul of western weapons for a counteroffensive against the Russian invaders.

Since last week, the Ukrainian military has begun pushing back Russian forces in and around the besieged city of Bakhmut, its first significant offensive operations since its troops recaptured the southern city of Kherson in November.

“The advance of our troops in the direction of Bakhmut is the first success of offensive actions in the defense of Bakhmut,” Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of the ground forces, said in a statement on the Telegram messaging app.

“The last few days have shown that we can advance and destroy the enemy even in such extremely difficult conditions,” he said. “We are fighting with fewer resources than the enemy. At the same time, we can ruin their plans.”

In its afternoon battlefield update on Monday, the Ukrainian Army General Staff said Russian forces were pushing to gain ground, backed by heavy shelling, but had failed to advance around the western periphery village of Ivanivske. from the city.

The battle for Bakhmut has become the longest and bloodiest of the war and has totemic significance for Russia, which has no other prizes to show for a winter campaign that cost thousands of lives.

For the past half year, Kiev has dug in on the defensive as Moscow mounted its campaign, sending hundreds of thousands of new reservists and mercenaries into Europe’s bloodiest ground combat since World War Two.

Kiev is now preparing a counteroffensive using hundreds of new tanks and armored vehicles sent by Western countries since early 2023, with the aim of retaking the sixth of Ukraine’s territory that Moscow claims to have annexed.

Zelenskiy met British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in London on Monday, the last stop on a tour that has taken him to Rome, Berlin and Paris over the past three days, bagging major new arms promises along the way.

Britain, which last week became the first Western country to offer Ukraine long-range cruise missiles, followed up during Zelenskiy’s visit by promising drones that could strike at a range of 200 km (125 miles).

Sunak’s government said it would soon start training Ukrainian pilots to fly fighter jets. French President Emmanuel Macron said in an interview with French television TF1 that France was open to training Ukrainian pilots, but that he and Zelenskiy had not discussed the delivery of fighter jets.

“I have not talked about airplanes. I have spoken of missiles. I have talked about training,” Macron said.

‘CRUCIAL MOMENT’

Zelenskiy described the new weapons promised by the Europeans as “important and powerful”.

In a video address of a train that took him back to Kiev, he said: “We came home with new military aid. Newer and more powerful weapons for the front, more protection for our people. Greater political support…”

Sunak said that the war was at a “crucial moment” and that Britain would stand its ground. “It is important that the Kremlin also know that we are not going away. We are here for the long haul.”

He Kremlin He said he did not believe the added hardware would change the course of what he calls a “special military operation” to eliminate security threats posed by kyiv’s pursuit of ties to the West. Kyiv and Western backers characterize Russia’s actions as an unprovoked land grab.

Ukrainian forces pushed back Russian troops from Kiev a year ago and regained ground in the second half of 2022, but have since endured a heavy Russian assault while waiting for weapons to arrive.

Ukrainian officials are generally tight-lipped on the details of the offensives underway, but have reported substantial territorial gains on the northern and southern outskirts of Bakhmut over the past week.

Moscow has acknowledged that it withdrew north of the city, and the head of Wagner’s private army fighting inside Bakhmut has said that Russia’s regular forces have fled positions on the northern and southern flanks.

Ukrainian officials describe the fighting in that area as localized advances, not the main counteroffensive that has yet to start.

A respected Russian media outlet report on saturday That four Russian military aircraft were shot down near the Belarusian and Ukrainian borders was inadvertently confirmed on Monday by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.

“Three days after the events near us, I mean in the Bryansk region, when four planes were shot down, we are forced to respond. Since then, we, our troops, have been on high alert,” Lukashenko was quoted as saying at an air force command base, according to the Pul Pervovo Telegram channel, a state media outlet that reports on Lukashenko’s activities.

There was no official response from Ukraine. But Mykhailo Podolyak, Zelenskiy’s top adviser, called the incident on Saturday “justice… and instant karma.”

Belarus is a close ally of Russia, which used it as a launching pad for the invasion, although Lukashenko has insisted that Belarus is not a party to the war and has not sent troops to fight alongside Russian forces.

Written by Peter Graff; Edited by Mark Heinrich

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