On the 122nd day, or four months, of war in Ukraine, fighting continues to escalate in the east of the country.
In the city of Sieverodonetsk, after weeks of fierce fighting, Ukraine withdrew its troops.
However, Kiev urges its allies to give it "
fire parity
" with the Russian forces by artillery reinforcement, to "
stabilize
" the situation in the Donbass.
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Order to withdraw from Sieverodonetsk
On Friday morning, Serguiï Gaïdaï, governor of the province of Lugansk (east), where Sieverodonetsk is located, announced on Telegram that the Ukrainian armed forces had
“received the order”
to withdraw from the city.
“
It no longer makes sense to stay in positions that have been constantly shelled for months
,” he said.
In this strategic lock of the region, “
all
the
essential infrastructures have been destroyed
” by continual bombardments
.
“
90% of the city is damaged, 80% of the houses will have to be destroyed
,” he says.
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On this Donbass front, “
the Ukrainian units are exhausted, bloodless.
They had terrible losses with completely neutralized battalions
”, explains a senior French officer on condition of anonymity, evoking units of 300 or 400 men of which there remained only about twenty valid.
kyiv asks for more artillery
Ukraine, which continues to demand more heavy weapons from its allies to counter Russian strike power, reiterated this call on Friday evening to "
stabilize
" the Eastern front.
"
I stressed the need to achieve parity of fire with the enemy, which will allow us to stabilize the situation in the most threatened region of Lugansk
," said Friday evening the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, reporting on his Facebook page on a telephone conversation with his American counterpart, General Mark Milley.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed the announcement by the White House of “
new military aid
” from the United States of $450 million.
"
This support
", which includes the delivery of additional Himars rocket launchers, "
is now more important than ever
," he said on Twitter.
Attack in Kherson
An official of the occupation administration installed by Russia in Kherson, a southern city under Russian control, was killed Friday in an attack.
This is the first time that the pro-Russian authorities have announced the death of one of their representatives in this type of attack, which is on the rise.
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Le Figaro
Wednesday, the pro-Russian official of the town hall of Tchornobaïvka had survived the explosion of a bomb in the passage of his car.
A few days earlier, the head of the penitentiary services of the Kherson region was injured in a bomb attack, while Ukrainian forces returned to the offensive in the area in an attempt to retake the lost territories.
For its part, the Ukrainian general staff welcomed the relative success of its troops in the southern region, forcing the Russians to retreat from their defensive positions near the village of Olhine.
Lysytchansk prepares for the arrival of the Russians
Lyssytchansk, a city adjoining Sieverodonetsk, is preparing for the arrival of the Russians.
The pro-Russian leader said it would take just over a week to control the city.
The main police station is closed, after being bombed on Monday.
At the entrance to the city, partly deprived of water, gas and electricity, Ukrainian soldiers are digging trenches.
Ukraine's candidacy for the EU: an "
aggressive approach
" according to Moscow
Russian diplomacy denounced on Friday the decision of the Twenty-Seven to grant Ukraine and Moldova the status of candidate for the European Union, a choice which "
confirms that a geopolitical monopolization of the space of the CIS ( the Commonwealth of Independent States, which brings together several countries of the former USSR, editor's note) is actively continuing in order to contain Russia
”, indicated the spokesperson for the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova.
Read alsoThe European Union reaches out to Ukraine
According to the Russian official, the EU aims “
to establish relations with the regions of its neighborhood based on the master-slave principle
”.
Brussels, she further claims, uses “
methods of political and economic blackmail
” and puts pressure on candidate states to take “
illegitimate sanctions
” against Moscow.
“
This aggressive approach by the European Union has the potential to create new schisms and much deeper crises in Europe
,” she continued.
A G7 scheduled for Sunday
Three days after the recognition of Ukraine and Moldova as EU candidates, Western leaders will try to close ranks and maintain their unity against Russia at two crucial summits: G7 from Sunday in Germany and NATO from June 28 to 30 in Madrid.
Civilian and military casualties
There is no overall assessment of the civilian victims of the conflict, which is certainly very heavy.
On the military level, Western security sources speak of 15,000 to 20,000 Russian soldiers killed.
Ukrainian forces are losing around 100 soldiers every day, according to kyiv.
No independent statistics are available.
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Russia, between anguish of the contraction of the territory and reassurance of the expansion
"
The Russian army said on Friday that it had killed with “
high precision weapons
” more than 200 foreign mercenaries and a hundred Ukrainian nationalists in the Mykolaiv region (south) and that of Kharkiv (northeast).
A third of displaced or refugee Ukrainians
More than seven million Ukrainians are displaced in the country, according to the UN.
Added to this are 7.7 million who have fled abroad.
Before the Russian invasion, Ukraine had 37 million inhabitants in the territory controlled by kyiv, amputated in particular from the Crimea annexed by Moscow in 2014.