Kyiv: Russian offensive on Bakhmut is failing
The Russians' plans to capture Bakhmut are collapsing, said the Head of the Ukrainian Presidential Administration, Andriy Yermak.
"The defense forces continue to deter the enemy in the east. Their plans to occupy Bakhmut are now failing," Yermak wrote on Telegram.
For his part, the press secretary of the Eastern Group of Forces of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Serhiy Cherevaty, said that Russian forces cannot complete the operation to capture Bakhmut and continue to carry out attacks "by inertia."
"Now they, in fact, tactically cannot complete the operation to capture the Ukrainian district center of Bakhmut. Yes, there are very active battles, they still continue to make several dozen inertia attacks, but they suffer huge losses. During the day, 16 clashes took place in the city itself. At the same time, the occupiers shelled the settlement and the surrounding area 55 times," the spokesman said.
"In general, 352 artillery strikes were inflicted on the Bakhmut segment of the front by different types of multiple launch rocket systems and barrel artillery. In total, 27 clashes and 4 airstrikes occurred in the Bakhmut direction over the past day. 193 occupiers were killed, 199 received various degree wounds," Cherevaty added.
He stressed that the current actions of the Russians in this direction can no longer be considered a strategic offensive operation.
Meanwhile, experts of the American Institute for the Study of War (ISW) argue that the statements of the Russian media that the Russian Armed Forces control most of Bakhmut are not true.
Russian bloggers claim that the sweep operation is currently underway in the territory of the AZOM metal processing plant. However, American military analysts have not found any evidence of this.
"ISW does not find visual evidence and Prigozhin's words that the "Wagnerians" are allegedly already 600-700 meters away from the Bakhmut administrative center and on the West Bank of the Bakhmutka River. It is also not true that Russia allegedly occupied 70% of the city's territory. According to ISW estimates, as of March 8, the Russian Federation occupied 50% of Bakhmut and since then the Russian forces have not advanced significantly, "American experts emphasized.