Moscow will “consult” the population to determine the borders of the annexed Ukrainian regions
The advance of the Ukrainian troops continues unstoppably on the Donbas front. After the capture of Limán, an important municipality in Donetsk that the invaders used as a transport hub, Kiev announced the capture of Torske on Monday.
The spokesman of the Eastern Group of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Serhiy Cherevati, emphasized that army units “have taken the village of Torske, en route to Kreminaya”, before adding that Russian troops are “trying to strengthen their positions in Kreminaya (in Luhansk) and building defenses.The Russian authorities have not commented so far.
It is the latest example of the invading forces crumbling, unable to stop a month-long counter-offensive that allows the Ukrainians to recapture large swaths of the country through forced marches. “The Russians withdrew. We broke their lines and have been hunting them ever since.” For example, a 26-year-old American volunteer told The New York Times about the advance of the Ukrainian army. “Actually, we’re destroying them,” he says.
The Ukrainian army has also made progress in recent hours on another front, to the south, in Kherson province, which was recently annexed by Moscow. An extreme that the pro-Russian authorities themselves have acknowledged. The head of the region, Vladimir Saldo, said in a televised interview on Monday that the situation is “tense”. “There is an advance in the Dudchany area and the Ukrainian troops have taken some settlements.” The area he refers to is on the western bank of the Dnipro River, some 25 miles (40 km) downstream from the previous day’s fighting.
The difficult military situation of the Russians has raised fears of a possible escalation of the conflict that could even lead to nuclear war. Many analysts in various media and blogs believe that the ongoing losses on the ground, coupled with Putin’s growing loneliness in Russia, raise fears that the Russian leader will choose to press the nuclear red button. The enormous dissatisfaction among the population about a partial mobilization that has turned out to be hasty and careless reinforces this feeling.
No one dares to predict what would happen next, though experts believe that US intelligence, which has been foolproof in its predictions, would detect the nuclear threat before it was carried out. Drones and satellites are closely monitoring the dozens of points from which the Kremlin could launch missiles.
Nor does the pressure exerted by various radical groups on the Kremlin help. This is the case of Chechen leader Ramzán Kadírov, who called for the use of “low-intensity nuclear weapons” after the Limán disaster. The Kremlin responded to his request on Monday. “In difficult times you have to exclude emotions,” said Peskov, who, however, has avoided criticizing Kadyrov.
Ukraine’s advance on the ground comes just days after Putin officially declared the annexation of four Ukrainian provinces: Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhya. This Monday, the Kremlin said it will “consult” the population on the exact boundaries of these regions. “We will continue to consult the people of these regions,” Kremlin spokesman Dimitri Peskov said when asked whether Russia is annexing all or only part of the territory it occupies in those areas.
The Donetsk and Lugansk regions were fully annexed after Moscow recognized the sovereignty of pro-Russian breakaway regimes in late February, just before the Russian attack on Ukraine. But the Kremlin said last week that the borders of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhya regions should be “clarified”.
The United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defense has highlighted the chaos in the mobilization of Russian reservists in its latest report. Local authorities are recruiting men who do not meet the criteria announced by Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Ministry of Defence, according to British intelligence. Officers of the Russian forces deployed to Ukraine are also experiencing difficulties training incoming reservists and finding soldiers to lead the new units, London notes. The governor of Russia’s Yabarovsk region, Mijail Degtiarev, has reported the resignation of a military commissar because half of the recruits he selected had to be returned home because they did not meet the criteria for mobilization.
Source: La Verdad
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