Ukrainian forces are struggling to stop a new Russian attack aimed at creating Putin’s planned “buffer zone.”
Russian forces attempted an armored ground invasion of Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region with artillery and guided aerial bombs, Ukrainian officials said.
Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said on Friday that Russian forces attempted to break through Ukrainian defenses near the town of Vovchansk with “armored vehicles” at 5 a.m. (0200 GMT), hitting an area near the border with air attacks. The assault was repelled, but “fighting of varying intensity” continued, the statement said.
A senior Ukrainian military source told the Reuters news agency that Russian forces had penetrated a kilometer into the region. Their goal, he said, was to advance up to 10 kilometers to establish the buffer zone that Russian President Vladimir Putin had promised to create earlier this year to stop Ukrainian attacks on border regions. Russians.
Ukraine previously said it was aware that Russia was amassing thousands of troops along the northeastern border. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his forces were ready for a ground attack.
“Ukraine welcomed them there with troops: brigades and artillery,” he said at a press conference.
Ukraine has sent more forces to the region as reinforcements.
Vitaliy Ganchev, a Russian official based in the Kharkiv region, said on the Telegram app that there was “fighting on several parts of the contact line, including in border areas,” and asked residents “to be careful and not to leave.” shelter without urgent need.”
Kharkiv Governor Oleh Syniehubov said authorities were evacuating about 3,000 civilians from Vovchansk, less than five kilometers from the border, which had suffered heavy shelling.
New facade
Ukraine drove Russian troops from most of the Kharkiv region in 2022, the first year of the war, but after resisting the Ukrainian counter-offensive last year, Russian forces are returning to the offensive and slowly advance into the Donetsk region, further south.
Fears grew in March over the Kremlin’s intentions in the Kharkiv region when Putin called for the creation of a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory when asked if he considered it necessary to take Kharkiv , which borders Belgorod, a Russian province that regularly suffers attacks from Ukraine.
Since then, Kharkiv, particularly vulnerable due to its proximity to Russia, has been hit by air raids which have caused significant damage to the region’s electrical infrastructure.
Friday’s assault opens a new front, with Russia apparently intending to exploit a window of opportunity to make small tactical gains while Ukraine remains under-equipped in terms of weapons and manpower.
Ukrainian officials have repeatedly said they need more Western-supplied weapons to resist and ultimately repel Russian troops. On Thursday, Zelensky said $61 billion in U.S. military aid would help reverse the trend.
Friday’s advance toward Kharkiv comes as Ukraine begins receiving packages of long-delayed U.S. military aid for the first time in weeks. A senior Ukrainian military source told Reuters on Friday that Ukraine hoped the U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets would be delivered in June-July.
Ukraine’s parliament voted Thursday to crack down on draft dodgers, as the country grapples with a severe shortage of soldiers available to fight more than two years of war.
The bill, supported by a majority of lawmakers but not yet signed into law by Zelensky, plans to increase fines for anyone caught trying to avoid the roll call and allow authorities to detain draft evaders for three days maximum.
It comes the same week that Parliament passed a bill allowing some convicts to enlist in the army and days before a new mobilization law, which lowers the minimum age for new recruits, comes into force.
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News Source : www.aljazeera.com
