প্রকাশ: 31/07/2022
Ukrainian President
Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Saturday his government was ordering the mandatory
evacuation of people in the eastern Donetsk region, scene of fierce fighting
with Russia.
In a late-night television address, Zelenskyy also said the
hundreds of thousands of people still in combat zones in the larger Donbas
region, which contains Donetsk as well as the neighboring Luhansk region,
needed to leave.
"The more people leave (the) Donetsk region now, the
fewer people the Russian army will have time to kill," he said, adding
that residents who left would be given compensation.
Separately, domestic Ukrainian media outlets quoted Deputy
Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk as saying the evacuation needed to take place
before winter begins since the region's natural gas supplies had been
destroyed.
Zelenskyy said hundreds of thousands of people were still
living in areas of Donbas where fighting was fierce.
"Many refuse to leave but it still needs to be
done," the president said. "If you have the opportunity, please talk
to those who still remain in the combat zones in Donbas. Please convince them
that it is necessary to leave."
It is not the first time Ukrainian authorities have called
for civilians to evacuate areas they control in Donetsk, and John Herbst, a
former US ambassador to Ukraine, told Reuters it could be due to expectations
of heavier fighting rather than fuel shortages.
"I don't know why Zelenskyy issued the call," he
said. "What I do know is that there has been fierce fighting in Donetsk.
The Russians took (neighbouring) Luhansk (oblast) several weeks ago. I expect
further fierce fighting in Donetsk."
Herbst said he did not expect Russia to capture the rest of
Donetsk given the longer logistics lines they would need and the Ukrainian
forces' use of advanced long-range artillery and rocket systems provided by the
United States and others.
Earlier on Saturday, Ukraine's military said more than 100 Russian
soldiers had been killed and seven tanks destroyed in fighting in the south on
Friday, including the Kherson region that is the focus of Kyiv's
counteroffensive in that part of the country and a key link in Moscow's supply
lines.
Rail traffic to Kherson over the Dnipro River had been cut,
the military's southern command said, potentially further isolating Russian
forces west of the river from supplies in occupied Crimea and the east.
South of the town of Bakhmut, which Russia has cited as a
prime target in Donetsk, the Ukrainian military said Russian forces had been
"partially successful" in establishing control over the settlement of
Semyhirya by storming it from three directions.
"He established himself on the outskirts of the
settlement," the military's evening report said, referring to Russian
forces.
Defence and intelligence officials from Britain, which has
been one of Ukraine's staunchest allies since Moscow invaded its neighbor on 24
February, portrayed Russian forces as struggling to maintain momentum.
Ukraine has used Western-supplied long-range missile systems
to badly damage three bridges across the Dnipro in recent weeks, cutting off
Kherson city and – in the assessment of British defence officials – leaving
Russia's 49th Army highly vulnerable on the river's west bank.
The Kherson region's pro-Ukrainian governor, Dmytro Butriy,
said fighting was continuing in many parts of the region, and that Berislav
district, just northwest of the Kakhovka hydroelectric plant, was particularly
hard hit.
"In some villages, not a single home has been left
intact, all infrastructure has been destroyed, people are living in
cellars," he wrote on Telegram.
Just to the north of Lysychansk, which Moscow's forces
captured in early July after weeks of fighting, Ukrainian partisans destroyed a
railway junction box near the Russian-controlled town of Svatove on Friday
night, making it harder for Moscow to transport ammunition to the front lines
by train, Luhansk regional governor Serhiy Gaidai said in an online post.
Reuters could not independently verify the battlefield
reports.
Officials from the Russian-appointed administration running
the Kherson region earlier this week rejected Western and Ukrainian assessments
of the situation.
On Friday the British ministry described the Russian
government as "growing desperate", having lost tens of thousands of
soldiers in the war. British MI6 foreign intelligence agency chief Richard
Moore added on Twitter that Russia is "running out of
steam."
Prison deaths
Ukraine and Russia have traded accusations over a missile
strike or explosion early on Friday that appeared to have killed dozens of
Ukrainian prisoners of war in the front-line town of Olenivka, held by
Moscow-backed separatists in eastern Donetsk.
Russia's defense ministry on Saturday published a list of 50
Ukrainian prisoners of war killed and 73 wounded in what it said was a
Ukrainian military strike with a US-made High Mobility Artillery Rocket System
(HIMARS).
Ministry spokesman Lieutenant-General Igor Konashenkov said
"all political, criminal and moral responsibility" rested with
Zelenskyy, "his criminal regime and Washington who supports them".
The ministry said Russia had invited experts from the United
Nations and the Red Cross to probe the deaths "in the interests of
conducting an objective investigation".
The separatists put the death toll at 53.
Ukraine's armed forces denied responsibility, saying Russian
artillery had targeted the prison to hide mistreatment there. Foreign Minister
Dmytro Kuleba said on Friday Russia had committed a war crime and called for
international condemnation.
Reuters could not immediately verify the differing versions
of events, but some of the deaths were confirmed by Reuters journalists who
visited the prison.
The United Nations said earlier it was prepared to send
experts to investigate if it obtains consent from both parties. The
International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said it was seeking access and
had offered to help evacuate the wounded.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed his
condolences in a Friday phone call with Kuleba and said Washington was
committed to "hold Russia accountable for atrocities," the US State
Department said.
Ukraine has accused Russia of atrocities against civilians
and identified more than 10,000 possible war crimes. Russia denies targeting
civilians and war crimes.
- Reuters
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