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Pixelated footage from Balaklija: the Ukrainian flag is hoisted
Photo:
UKRAINE DEFENSE MINISTRY / HANDOUT / EPA
It's news that Ukrainians have been waiting for months: Ukrainian military personnel are hoisting the blue and yellow flag in areas formerly occupied by Russian troops.
According to Ukrainian sources, this happened in the city of Balaklija in the Kharkiv region.
The strategically important city of Izyum was also taken, as was even admitted by the Ministry of Defense in Moscow, which usually reacted tight-lipped to military defeats.
Albeit indirectly: according to this, the Russian troops had withdrawn from the cities for a “regrouping”.
"Guys and girls of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, today you are writing a new history of free Ukraine, we are proud," wrote the head of the regional military administration Oleg Synegubov.
A new story that is said to have only just begun.
"To be continued," wrote Synegubov.
The past few days, with the start of the surprising Ukrainian counter-offensive in Kharkiv Oblast, seem like the start of a game of dominoes.
Several Russian-held cities fell one after the other on Saturday.
Some Ukrainians are already celebrating one of the "greatest days in modern history" on social media.
A report by the Russian news agency TASS late on Saturday afternoon shows how dramatic the situation is for the Russian invaders.
The head of the Russian military administration in the Kharkiv region, Vitaly Gantchev, called on residents to leave the oblast to save their lives.
"Staying in his house now is dangerous."
The Russian occupiers are apparently giving up an entire region.
Especially since the Kharkiv region in northeastern Ukraine, with its cities of Krupjansk and Izyum, is of enormous strategic importance for Russian ambitions in the Donbass.
And that's not all: there are also reports of an impending capture of the city of Lyssychansk in the Luhansk Oblast, in which a "people's republic" was proclaimed months ago.
Ukrainian troops are reportedly already in the city center.
And the Russian army?
So withdrawn without a fight.
The next stop will be the neighboring city of Sievjerodonetsk.
As is always the case in war, one should also be careful with reports from the Ukrainian side.
But one thing now seems at least possible: the Russian army could collapse in eastern Ukraine.
Surprise attack on the northeast
A surprise Ukrainian offensive has been underway in the northeast since Tuesday.
One had actually been announced for Cherson in the south of the country.
Military experts say Russia has been caught off guard on a vulnerable stretch of its front line.
Within a few days, Ukrainian troops advanced dozens of kilometers behind enemy lines.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyj recently spoke of more than 30 recaptured settlements in the Kharkiv region.
That was before the reports from Krupyansk, Izyum and Balakliya.
The Ukrainian euphoria is correspondingly high.
It should be noted that all statements in the social media are always part of the propaganda - which is part of modern warfare.
It is hoped that the greater the success of the Ukrainian armed forces, the greater the fear and terror that will spread among Russian soldiers.
The Ministry of Defense in Kyiv tweeted a video of a whole battalion of Ukrainian soldiers apparently singing the national anthem in a forest to the sound of violins.
"Before the fight," it says.
A Ukrainian government adviser even joked on Twitter that Russia is demanding an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council.
'They promised an offensive to Kherson and are taking Izyum instead!
Not fair!« Garnished with the note: »Of course I’m joking.«
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