Attacks in eastern Ukraine could intensify (Analysis)

This is how Russian troops move around Kyiv 1:13

Lviv, Ukraine (CNN) -- 

The Russian military says it has entered a new phase of its so-called "special military operation" in Ukraine, saying it is shifting its focus to the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.

Is this regrouping of forces a maneuver, allowing the battered Russian forces to regroup after suffering heavy losses at the hands of the Ukrainian defenders, or simply a face-saving measure?

Is Russia really moving troops and equipment to concentrate on eastern Ukraine, where Moscow has recognized two breakaway republics?

On paper, it seems so.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Major General Igor Konashenkov said a "planned regrouping of troops" was taking place around Kyiv and Chernihiv, a day after Russian negotiators said forces of Moscow would take steps towards de-escalation around those two cities.

The general said that Russian forces were regrouping to "intensify operations in priority areas and, above all, to complete the operation for the complete liberation of Donbas."

US officials and military analysts have rightly been skeptical of Russia's claims of de-escalation, with some observers suggesting that Russia's shifting military objectives are intended to hide massive battlefield setbacks.

But there is evidence that Russian military activity is increasing in the east: Ukrainian authorities on Thursday reported heavy shelling of several Ukrainian cities, especially in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions of Donbas and around the city of Kharkiv, northeast of Ukraine.

Kharkiv was heavily shelled, look at the pictures.

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Intensification of attacks in eastern Ukraine

In a statement on Telegram, Oleh Synyehubov, the head of the military administration of the Kharkiv region, said: "In the last day, Russian troops have struck 47 times with artillery, mortar, tank and strikes in Piatihatky areas, Oleksiyivka and the residential area of ​​the Kharkiv Traсtor Plant district About 380 shellings by Grad and Smerch [rocket artillery] were recorded In Saltivka, the enemy damaged the gas pipeline, there was a big fire and rescuers have worked to locate it ".

Synyehubov said Russian forces had inflicted an intense attack on Derhachi, northwest of the city of Kharkiv, killing one person and wounding three others, and destroying a city hall building.

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"The fiercest point [in the Kharkiv region] remains Izium, where fighting and constant shelling continue," he said.

"We are working every day to open 'green' [humanitarian] corridors. But so far Russia is not giving us that opportunity."

Ukraine's military governors of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions also reported heavy shelling on Thursday amid an apparent shift by the Russian military to redirect military efforts to the Donbas region.

"We clearly feel that the transfer of [military] technology to our direction is starting," Serhiy Haidai, head of the military administration of the Luhansk region, said in televised remarks.

"And as equipment and personnel are handed over, our enemies do nothing but shoot with greater density and power. There is already everything here: planes, artillery, large-caliber weapons, mortars... all the settlements are being bombed".

Russian soldiers seen on top of a tank in the separatist-controlled Volnovakha district of Donetsk, eastern Ukraine, on March 26.

Pavlo Kyrylenko, head of the military administration of the Donetsk region, said on Telegram that Russian forces continued shelling overnight in the central part of the region.

"In Maryinka, Krasnohorivka and Novomykhailivka, the enemy again used white phosphorus shells," he said, referring to munitions banned or restricted by international law in populated areas.

"Eleven injured civilians from the Maryinka community, including 4 children, were transferred to the Kurakhiv city hospital."

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia never violates international conventions when asked to comment on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's claim that Russian forces used phosphorous bombs, the media reported. Russian media.

Pentagon warns that Russian troops may be resupplying in Belarus 6:36

Doubts about the morale of the Russian troops

Ukraine's General Staff said in a statement Thursday that Russian forces may be regrouping on the territory of Belarus, which has been a staging post for Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

The statement says that the movement of Russian military equipment in Belarus has been observed, "probably to regroup units, as well as to create a reserve to replenish the losses of personnel, weapons and equipment of groups operating in Ukraine."

External analyzes suggest that Russian troops have suffered severe equipment losses and heavy casualties.

The Russian military declared nearly a week ago that 1,351 military personnel had been killed in Ukraine and 3,825 wounded, casualty figures that the United States, Ukraine and NATO say are a fairly low representation of actual troop losses.

Jeremy Fleming, Director of the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), a UK spy agency speaking during a trip to Canberra, Australia, suggested that the morale of the Russian troops was slipping and that the Russian President Vladimir Putin, who lives in an information bubble as well as in physical isolation, may not be aware of the magnitude of the problem for his military.

"We have seen Russian soldiers, lacking in weapons and morale, refuse to follow orders, sabotage their own equipment and even accidentally shoot down their own planes. And while we believe Putin's advisers are afraid to tell him the truth, what is happening and the scope of these errors must be made very clear to the regime.

On Thursday, Putin signed a decree to recruit 134,500 Russians to replace conscripts leaving the service.

The Russian Army has a mixed personnel system that features conscripts and contract service members, and the country has a call-up twice a year.

Putin initially claimed the conscripts would not take part in the war, but the country's Defense Ministry later acknowledged that the conscripts were fighting in Ukraine, and Ukrainian forces say they have taken a significant number of Russian conscripts prisoner.

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An intensifying humanitarian crisis

The humanitarian situation remains dire in many Ukrainian cities, especially in the beleaguered port city of Mariupol in the south-east of the country.

Hopes were raised on Thursday that buses loaded with residents of Mariupol, which has been under incessant bombardment by Russian forces for weeks, could leave through a so-called humanitarian corridor.

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But the convoy was held up at a Russian checkpoint in Vasylivka, a town between the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhia and the Russian city of Berdyansk, according to Iryna Vereshchuk, Ukraine's Minister for Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories.

Vereshchuk said about 100,000 people remain in the city who require immediate evacuation, out of a pre-war population of more than 400,000.

"That is, another 100,000 women, children, elderly and disabled who need our help and that of the world," he said.

Ukrainian authorities say around 90% of the city's buildings have been damaged or uninhabitable after weeks of shelling.

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