Leer en Español
Ukrainian Defense Ministry spokesman Colonel Oleksandr Motuzyanyk told EFE News today that there has indeed been a “partial withdrawal of enemy units” around Kyiv, the day after Russia pledged to reduce the presence of its troops in the capital.
“However, we cannot yet speak of a large-scale withdrawal,” the spokesman told EFE, also pointing out that “it is too early to know what Russia’s intentions are.”
In yesterday’s cease-fire negotiations in Istanbul, Russia pledged to significantly reduce its activities both in Kyiv and in the city of Chernihiv, although tonight attacks were registered in both places.
The colonel indicated that those Russian units in the center of the country are withdrawing eastward to Donetsk and Luhansk provinces, in line with recent Russian statements that they had already completed the “first phase of the operation.”
“We can confirm that information because we have seen that they are concentrating their activity there. The enemy’s offensive attempts have not ceased there,” the defense spokesman clarified about the situation in the eastern Donbas region, where a low-intensity civil war had already been raging since 2014 with pro-Russian militias.
Motuzyanyk pointed out that to take a city like Kyiv it takes hundreds of thousands of troops, which right now Russia does not have, and that “the enemy” has also failed in its attempt to dominate the strategic Odessa, where they have only managed to launch “reconnaissance actions” with small attacks from the coast to know from where Ukraine responds.
According to the spokesman, in the areas occupied by Russia, mainly in the Donbas, its troops “continue to use high-precision weapons to destroy critical infrastructure throughout Ukraine,” in addition to organizing the dispatch of reinforcements and maintaining repression against civilians in an “attempt to impose an occupation authority on the territories they temporarily control.”
“The enemy uses operational and long-range tactical aircraft. Russian Su-34 bombers fired missiles at targets in Zhytomyr, Kyiv, Chernihiv, Kharkiv, and Donetsk regions.
According to Ukrainian Defense Ministry figures, during this war, the Russian Army has lost more than 17,300 soldiers, 605 tanks, 1,723 armed vehicles, 131 aircraft, and the same number of helicopters.
