As of: February 20, 2024, 3:08 p.m
By: Christian Nemeth
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Press
Split
Russia celebrates a major propaganda success with the capture of the city of Avdiivka.
The Ukrainian withdrawal was probably disorderly and tragic.
Avdiivka - Avdiivka, which has been battered for years, gave Vladimir Putin's army a not insignificant success story in the Ukraine war.
Russia captured the small Ukrainian town near Donetsk after fierce fighting that earned the town a reputation as one of the fighting's "meat grinders" - albeit at a high and bloody price.
For the Ukrainian armed forces, the outcome of the battle represents a fiasco.
Apparently numerous wounded soldiers were left behind during the hasty retreat.
A Bradley infantry fighting vehicle of the Ukrainian Armed Forces captured by Russian troops in the city of Avdiivka.
© IMAGO/ITAR-TASS
Ukraine's Avdiivka withdrawal: injured soldiers apparently remained behind
According to
CNN,
the Ukrainian army had to withdraw from Avdiivka quickly and without regard to casualties on Saturday (February 17), while its President Volodymyr Zelensky was at the Munich Security Conference.
A soldier was literally ordered: “Leave the 300 wounded behind and burn everything.”
A few hours after Russia's flag was raised over the embattled city, a rumor spread that injured Ukrainian soldiers had been killed immediately after the occupying army arrived.
It mainly affected members of the 110th Separate Mechanized Brigade, who had defended a position called “Zenith” and were probably no longer able to escape from the ruins.
They had apparently hoped in vain for rescue for around a day and a half.
Zelenskyj had declared at the security conference that the withdrawal from Avdiivka was a “professional decision” with clear motives: “Our soldiers are people,” he emphasized.
Avdiivka falls to Russia: Critical voices after chaotic withdrawal from Ukraine
In Ukraine, critical voices are increasing after the apparently unorganized withdrawal and the presumably heavy losses.
A surviving soldier told the
world
in a video interview: “The withdrawal should have come much earlier and when it finally came, nothing was prepared.
No armored evacuation vehicles, no concrete plan.
Many units were left to their own devices.”
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This source also confirmed that of the estimated 1,500 Ukrainian soldiers, hundreds of people were probably unable to escape.
The soldier mentioned here also reported that the battalion headquarters had ordered the wounded to be left behind and all remains to be burned.
In the middle of Avdiivka: The Russian conquerors have placed a flag on a Ukrainian soldiers' monument.
© IMAGO/SNA
Ukraine soldiers horrified: “Road to Avdiivka full of Ukrainian corpses”
Even those soldiers who ultimately managed to escape had to contend with the greatest adversity,
CNN
said .
One survivor outlined his route out of the city as follows: “There was no visibility outside.
It was all about survival.
One kilometer across the field.
A bunch of blind kittens controlled by a drone.
Enemy artillery.
The road to Avdiivka is full of Ukrainian corpses.”
This man also stated that during his escape he was informed by the Ukrainian military leadership that six wounded people he knew would not be evacuated.
“Their despair, their downfall.
It will always remain with us.
The bravest are the ones who die,” he said.
Emotional video calls shortly before Russia's invasion of Avdiivka
CNN
also reported emotional scenes and recordings that are said to show soldiers who had contacted their families via video call shortly before the Russians arrived.
The sister of a man who has been fighting for Ukraine in the region for two years asked her brother
if no one was coming to pick him up, in a sequence obtained by
CNN .
He replied: “Everyone left, everyone withdrew.
They told us that a car would pick us up.
I have two broken legs and splinters in my back.
I can’t do anything.” Other comrades feel the same way.
Many of the Ukrainians who were not evacuated now appear to have been killed.
At least that's what a video published a few days ago by a Russian military blogger suggests: It shows several corpses in Avdiivka.
Relatives or former comrades of the Ukrainian soldiers could have clearly identified several missing people through features such as tattoos.
The 110th Brigade, CNN
reported
, now wants to review the incidents and recordings.
Avdiivka was almost completely destroyed in the Ukrainian war
Avdiivka became a frontline city in 2014, when the war in Donbass began, and became a target of Putin's army again from February 24, 2022, when Russia launched the attack on its neighboring country.
The city is now considered to be almost completely destroyed; in October 2023, only around 1,000 of the original 32,500 residents were said to still be living in the town.
The capture of the city by the Russians, who, according to Ukrainian sources, are said to have lost around 50,000 soldiers in the fighting for Avdiivka, is considered Putin's greatest military victory since the capture of the city of Bakhmut last year.
Meanwhile, the Munich Security Conference once again showed that Ukraine needs more and faster help from its Western allies.
(chnnn)