Russian troops 'storm activities' near chemical plant - hundreds entrenched
Created: 06/25/2022, 04:48 am
By: Karolin Schäfer, Katja Thorwarth, Marvin Ziegele
In the Ukraine war, Russian troops are advancing, Ukraine is resisting.
Sievjerodonetsk falls into the hands of the attackers.
The news ticker.
Heavy fighting in eastern Ukraine
: Russian troops continue to advance in the Ukraine war.
City in Focus
: Russia largely controls the city of Sievjerodonetsk.
Ukraine conflict: This news ticker is continuously updated by our editorial staff.
Some of the information comes from warring factions and cannot be directly checked independently.
+++ 10:30 p.m .:
“By what right or logic does Russia insist on inspecting Ukrainian ships leaving Ukrainian ports and going to other countries?
It makes no sense,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told CNN's Fred Pleitgen at a press conference in Germany on Friday (June 24).
Blinken is in Berlin for a ministerial conference on food security.
He also said that Ukraine needs assurances that its ports are safe from potential Russian ships.
US Secretary of State: 'Ukraine needs reassurances Russian ships are safe'
Blinken did not discuss whether there had been any progress in outsourcing Ukrainian grain.
However, he expressed his support for the United Nations, which is trying to work with both the Russians and the Ukrainians to find a solution.
“The United Nations and the Secretary-General have been working very hard to reach an agreement that would allow Ukrainian ships to leave Odessa and carry food and grain.
We strongly support this effort," said Blinken.
Russian troops 'storm activities' near chemical plant - hundreds entrenched
+++ 8:00 p.m .:
Despite Kiev’s fundamental decision to give up the heavily contested administrative center Sievjerodonetsk in eastern Ukraine, according to the German Press Agency, troops loyal to the government, but also civilians, are still stuck in the former city.
This emerges from the situation report of the general staff and from statements by the district administration on Friday.
Russian troops "conducted storming activities in the Sievarodonetsk industrial zone," the General Staff said.
According to the head of the district administration, Roman Vlasenko, the withdrawal of the Ukrainian troops will take a few more days.
In an interview with the US broadcaster CNN, he also said that 568 civilians were still hiding from the attacks in the chemical plant "Azot".
These could leave the plant as soon as the fire had stopped, but then only in the direction of Russian-occupied areas, said Wlassenko.
War in Ukraine: Russian troops 'conducted storming activities in Sievarodonetsk industrial zone', General Staff said.
© SERGEY BOBOK
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Ukraine-News: Russia apparently plans attacks "against civilians" in Belarus
+++ 5:05 p.m .:
According to information from the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense, the Kremlin is planning a “series of provocations against infrastructure and civilians” in Belarus in order to “engage the country in a military conflict with Ukraine,” the ministry wrote on Telegram.
Among other things, residential buildings in Masyr could be bombed, it said.
Groups disguised as civilians are said to have arrived in the southeastern city, including employees of the Russian secret service and mercenaries from private military companies.
The Ukrainian Ministry of Defense expects a scenario similar to that in the 1990s “during the outbreak of the war in Chechnya.” The information cannot initially be checked independently.
Belarus recently increased its military presence on the border with Ukraine.
Ukrainian soldiers on an armored vehicle in the Luhansk region.
© ANATOLII STEPANOV/AFP
Ukraine War: New weapons arrived from the US
+++ 4.15 p.m .:
The first delivery of four mobile artillery rocket systems, which the United States had promised Ukraine, have now arrived, a spokesman for the US Department of Defense confirmed.
The newly announced deliveries of the four multiple rocket launcher artillery systems by Himar are expected to arrive "mid-July".
In addition, Ukrainians are currently being trained to operate such systems, CNN reported, citing the US defense official.
+++ 15:22:
The Russian military is advancing in the Luhansk region.
In the meantime, the city of Hirske in eastern Ukraine has also been conquered by Russian occupiers.
This was announced by Oleksiy Babchenko, head of the community, according to the Arab news agency Aljazeera.
"Unfortunately, the entire Hirske district has been occupied since today," Babtschenko said on a television program.
There is still some "minor local fighting" but the enemy has invaded.
Ukraine War: Withdrawal from Seyerodonetsk could take days
+++ 14:11:
The withdrawal of the Ukrainian troops from the city of Sievjerodonetsk could take several days, reports the US news channel CNN.
According to the assessment of the head of the city's military administration, there are many units in Seyerodonetsk.
He added that there are still civilians in the city.
"They will be able to leave the city once the shelling is over, but into the occupied territories," he added.
+++ 12.45 p.m .:
According to their own statements, Russian and pro-Russian fighters have conquered several settlements in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk.
Ten towns have been "liberated" in the past few days, Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in Moscow on Friday.
At the same time, the Luhansk separatists showed the hoisting of a Soviet flag on the building of the city administration of Zolote, which is located south of the embattled city of Lysychansk.
According to them, the Ukrainian troops located in the Hirske-Solote pocket were "liquidated".
Initially, there was no confirmation from the Ukrainian side.
The military leadership in Moscow has not yet reported the complete capture of these two towns.
According to Konashenkov, around 2,000 Ukrainian fighters were surrounded there and are under continuous fire.
It was announced on Thursday that Russian troops had surrounded the area around the two settlements.
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Ukraine-News: Pro-Russian politician 'blown up' - withdrawal from Sieverodonetsk
+++ 11.58 a.m .:
According to information from the US news channel CNN, Russian forces have destroyed some of the roads leading to the city of Lysychansk in the Luhansk region.
The broadcaster refers to a telegram post by the Ukrainian head of the Luhansk regional military administration, Serhiy Hayday.
"The Russians are using helicopters to destroy the roads and bridges leading to Lysychansk," he wrote.
+++ 10.58 a.m .:
According to their own statements, Russian and pro-Russian fighters have conquered the settlements of Hirske and Solote in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk.
Luhansk separatists on Friday showed the hoisting of a Soviet flag atop the Zolote city government building, south of the embattled city of Lysychansk.
Initially, there was no confirmation from the Ukrainian side.
It was announced on Thursday that Russian troops had surrounded the area around the two settlements.
It remained unclear whether at least parts of the Ukrainian units were able to withdraw in time and thus save themselves.
War in Ukraine: Ukraine gives up strategically important city of Sievjerodonetsk
+++ 08.00 a.m .:
After weeks of bitter resistance against the Russian attackers, the Ukrainian army has to withdraw from the strategically important city of Sievjerodonetsk in the east of the country.
The withdrawal of Ukrainian troops has been ordered, the governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Hajday, announced on Friday (June 24) in the online service Telegram.
The Russian units had recently taken over the city almost completely.
Update from Friday, June 24th, 2022, 7.15 a.m .:
US President Joe Biden is traveling this Saturday (June 25) to the G7 summit, which will take place from Sunday to Tuesday at Schloss Elmau in Bavaria.
According to the White House, the aim of the summit is to "further isolate Russia from the global economy, target the Russian arms supply chain and continue to work against the circumvention of these unprecedented sanctions".
After the G7 meeting, Biden travels to a NATO summit in Madrid.
There, too, the Ukraine war will be the focus.
Ukraine War: Russia to attack villages with phosphorus weapons
+++ 8.15 p.m .:
Russia is said to have attacked Ukrainian villages with banned phosphorus ammunition.
The head of the military administration of the Sumy region made this accusation on Telegram on Thursday (June 23).
He also posted footage from a moving car showing glaring burning objects on the ground.
Information on victims and destruction is still to be clarified.
Russia has previously been accused of using banned weapons in the Ukraine war.
As the Ukrainian news site Pravda reports, military experts assume that neither Ukraine nor Russia has phosphorus munitions in use.
Instead, they could be flammable projectiles, the use of which near civilian areas is also prohibited under international humanitarian law.
+++ 6.15 p.m .:
The UN Human Rights Agency confirmed as of June 22 that 4,662 civilians have been killed and 5,803 injured in Ukraine since February 24.
At least 320 children were killed and 479 were injured.
+++ 3.20 p.m .:
For the fight against the Russian invasion troops, Ukraine has now received US HIMARS rocket launcher systems after German howitzers.
"Summer will be hot for the Russian occupiers and for some of them the last," Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov wrote on Twitter on Thursday.
Ukraine war: fight in Luhansk “at its peak”
+++ 1:14 p.m .:
The battle for the cities of Sievjerodonetsk and Lysychansk has “reached its peak.” That said Oleksiy Arestovych, adviser to the head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office, during a speech on television, according to information from CNN.
"This phase looks frightening from a military point of view," he said.
Arestovych compared the situation with the “18.
round" of a boxing match.
“Any side that sends two artillery battalions there wins this battle.
Let's see who's sending them.
Who has [these battalions] - only the military commands on both sides know that.”
First report from Thursday, June 23, 11:51 a.m.:
Kiev – In the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk, Ukrainian troops south of the strategically important city of Lyssychansk are acutely threatened with encirclement by Russian units.
"In the direction of Sieverodonetsk, the enemy captured the settlements of Lozkutivka and Raj-Oleksandrivka," the Ukrainian General Staff said on Facebook.
This means that the Ukrainian units around the miners' settlement only have a maximum of four kilometers wide to retreat.
According to British intelligence, some Ukrainian troops withdrew.
According to the separatists, however, this is already controlled by the Russian units.
This cannot be verified independently.
According to the representative of the Luhansk separatists in Moscow, Rodion Miroshnik, the Russian troops have already cut the last connecting road from Lysychansk to the west.
According to his estimates, at least 5,000 Ukrainian soldiers are surrounded.
Ukraine News: Heavy fighting south of Sieverodonetsk
Heavy fighting is also raging south of Sievjerodonetsk, which has largely been conquered by the Russians.
Sievjerodonetsk and Lysychansk are the last major cities in the Luhansk region still under Ukrainian control.
The conquest of Luhansk - like that of the Donetsk region - is one of Russia's main goals in the war against Ukraine that began four months ago.
The Russian advances are likely a result of recent reinforcements and a heavy concentration of shelling, the UK Ministry of Defense tweeted.
Despite strong pressure exerted by Russian troops on the Lysychansk-Syeverodonetsk pocket, efforts to achieve a deeper encirclement of the western Donetsk region remained deadlocked.
(marv/dpa)
