Ukraine: Putin satisfied with the progress of his troops

Vladimir Putin welcomed Wednesday of advances in Ukraine by the Russian army which claimed responsibility for the attack. the capture of several localities in the Kharkiv region (north-east) where she has been leading an offensive for a week.

This attack across the border, from the north, took Ukrainian forces by surprise, weakened by the lack of weapons and men after more than two years of war and months of delay. Western aid.

During a meeting broadcast on Russian television with high-ranking officers and the new Minister of Defense, Andrei Beloussov, the Russian president expressed his satisfaction.

< p>“Since the beginning of the year, our troops have been constantly improving their positions every day in all directions. They are meeting all the objectives set by the Ministry of Defense,” he said.

“The speed with which we react to the demands of the moment gives us confidence that we will fulfill all the goals,” added the Kremlin leader.< /p>

The Russian Defense Ministry announced the conquest of the localities of Glyboké and Lukiantsi in the Kharkiv region, a few hours after the Ukrainians admitted to having ceded ground in this region.

In the south, the Russian military claimed to have recaptured the destroyed village of Robotyné, a symbolic locality because it was one of the rare Ukrainian conquests during the counter-offensive in the summer of 2023.

– Two billion dollars for defense –

Visiting at the same time in Kiev, the head of American diplomacy Antony Blinken reported the release of aid amounting to two billion dollars to strengthen Ukrainian defense capabilities.

This comes from the $60 billion envelope recently approved in the United States by Congress after months of obstruction by the Republicans.

He further ruled that it was up to the Ukrainians to decide whether to strike Russian territory, while Russia had warned the West against attacking its territory using weapons of its own making.

Russian advance in the Kharkiv region © AFP – Hervé BOUILLY, Sylvie HUSSON, Paz PIZARRO, Gal ROMA

At least two people were also killed on Wednesday following a Russian missile attack on Dnipro, a large city in east-central Ukraine, lamented the governor of the Dnipropetrovsk region, citing “infrastructure damaged”.

– Withdrawal –

In the northeast, the Russian army quickly seized several villages in recent days, after a long massive bombing campaign.

“Around 8,000 people”, mostly “women, elderly people, people with reduced mobility “, disabled people and children”, according to emergency services, were evacuated from localities affected by the fighting taking place around thirty kilometers from Kharkiv, the eponymous capital of the region and second largest city in Ukraine.

Before the Russian announcement of the capture of new villages, the Ukrainian army said it had withdrawn in “certain places in the Lukiantsi and Vovchansk areas, due to enemy fire and assault actions.” .

Villagers flee a town near Kharkiv, May 13, 2024 © AFP – Roman PILIPEY

“Maneuvers were carried out to save the lives of our soldiers, the units were moved to more advantageous positions,” insisted the spokesperson for Ukrainian troops in the region, Nazar Voloshin.

To counter the Russian assaults, “additional forces are deployed,” explained Serguiï Nykyforov, Volodymyr Zelensky’s spokesperson.

In In this context, the president has canceled all his trips abroad “for the next few days”, he confided.

– “The enemy is in the streets” –

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (l) welcomes US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, May 14, 2024 in kyiv © POOL – Brendan SMIALOWSKI

According to the Telegram channel DeepState, close to the Ukrainian military, the Russians managed to occupy a strip of approximately 80 km2 around Lukiantsi and another of 53 km2 towards Vovtchansk.

In the latter city, which had 18,000 inhabitants before the war, “the situation is extremely difficult” and “the enemy is taking positions in the streets”, admitted Oleksiï Kharkivsky, the police chief local.

Some military analysts believe that Moscow could force Ukraine to divert its troops from other areas, particularly in the east, such as around the strategic city of Tchassiv Iar, in the Donetsk region, where the Russians are also progressing.

The head of American diplomacy, for his part, assured Tuesday that American military aid was ” en route”, promising that it “will make a real difference on the battlefield”.

The slowness of European aid and the almost total stoppage during months of that of the United States, put Ukraine in great difficulty at the very moment when Russia, with a war economy, regained the initiative on the ground at the end of 2023.

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