Ukraine battles on in Bakhmut as Finland joins NATO
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[April 04, 2023]
By Pavel Polityuk
KYIV (Reuters) - Fighting raged in and around Bakhmut as Ukraine mocked
Russian claims to have captured the administrative centre of the eastern
Ukrainian city, saying Russian forces had raised a victory flag over
"some kind of toilet".
Finland, which shares a 1,300-km (810-mile) border with Russia, will
later on Tuesday join NATO, just over a year after Russia invaded
Ukraine, partly in response to what Russia said the alliance's
aggressive expansion eastward.
The battle for the mining city and logistics hub of Bakhmut has been one
of the bloodiest of the conflict with heavy casualties on both sides and
the city largely destroyed.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner mercenary force spearheading the
siege, said on Sunday his troops had raised a Russian flag on the
city-centre administrative building even though Ukrainian soldiers still
held some western positions.
But Ukraine's military poured scorn on that claim and said fighting was
raging around the city council building, as well as in other nearby
towns.
"Bakhmut is Ukrainian and they have not captured anything and are very
far from doing that," Serhiy Cherevatyi, spokesperson for the eastern
military command, told Reuters.
"They raised the flag over some kind of toilet. They attached it to the
side of who knows what, hung their rag and said they had captured the
city. Well good, let them think they've taken it," Cherevatyi added by
telephone.
The Ukrainian armed forces General Staff said in an evening statement 45
enemy attacks had been repelled in total in the last 24 hours, with
Bakhmut at the "epicentre of operations" along with the cities of
Avdiivka and Maryinka further south.
Reuters could not verify the battlefield reports.
'WAITING FOR ORDERS'
On the edge of a part of Donetsk province under Russian control, Bakhmut
had a population of 70,000 before Russia invaded Ukraine in February
last year.
Russian forces, bogged down in a war of attrition after a series of
setbacks, are seeking a victory from their winter offensive but have
suffered huge casualties around Bakhmut.
Ukrainian military commanders have said their own counteroffensive -
backed by newly delivered Western tanks and other hardware - is not far
off but have stressed the importance of holding Bakhmut and inflicting
losses in the meantime.
"People are ready for the counteroffensive, all we are waiting for is
marching orders and details on which direction we should go forward on -
Bakhmut, Soledar or anywhere else," said a 35-year-old soldier of a tank
brigade near Bakhmut, who used the nom-de-guerre Polyot.
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Nataliya, 56, reacts as Alaska State Sno-X
Lions volunteers arrive to evacuate her with her dog Badi from the
town of Chasiv Yar, near the frontline, where her husband decided to
remain with their remaining pets, as Russia's invasion of Ukraine
continues, in the eastern region of Donetsk, Ukraine, April 2, 2023.
REUTERS/Violeta Santos Moura
Russia launched up to 17 Iranian-made Shahed drones overnight,
Ukraine's air force command said early on Tuesday, with its air-defence
systems destroying 14 of them.
Yuriy Kruk, head of the regional military administration in the
Black Sea port city of Odesa, said the region was struck by several
drones and there was damage but he did not specify the extent.
Four civilians were killed and three wounded in Ukraine-controlled
Donetsk, its governor, Pavlo Kyrylenko, said in a statement.
'DRIVING A WEDGE'
Russia calls its invasion of Ukraine a "special military operation"
to rid it of Nazis.
Tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians and soldiers on both sides
have been killed. Russia has destroyed Ukrainian cities and forced
millions of people to flee their homes, and it claims to have
annexed nearly a fifth of Ukraine.
The West calls the war an unprovoked assault to subdue an
independent country and has provided Kyiv with weapons while seeking
to punish Russia with sanctions.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused the West of trying to
drive a wedge between Russia and China, and attempting to wreck
Russia's planned summit with African countries. He also said the
European Union's hostile stance towards Moscow meant it had "lost"
Russia.
Echoing that anger, Russia's parliament speaker said Western leaders
have blood on their hands for supporting Ukraine's President
Volodymyr Zelenskiy and the support had led to the creation of a
"terrorist state" at Europe's centre.
Vyacheslav Volodin, an ally of President Vladimir Putin, said the
killing of prominent war blogger Vladlen Tatarsky in a bomb attack
in St Petersburg over the weekend was a "terrorist act" committed by
Kyiv.
Ukraine blamed "domestic terrorism" for the blast.
NATO will welcome Finland as its 31st member in a flag-raising
ceremony at its headquarters on the outskirts of Brussels.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine prompted Finns to seek security under
the umbrella of NATO's collective defence pact, which states that an
attack on one member is an attack on all.
Russia has also said it would strengthen its military capacity in
its western and northwestern regions in response to Finland's
accession.
(Additional reporting by Nick Starkov, Ron Popeski, Lidia Kelly,
Mark Trevelyan and Felix Light; Writing by Lincoln Feast; Editing by
Stephen Coates, Robert Birsel)
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