after the “capture” of Bakhmout, the Russian media hail a “historic moment”

Wagner’s boss, Yevgeny Prigojine, had announced on Saturday May 20 the capture of Bakhmout, but the Russian public television Rossia 1 waited for the official message of congratulations from Vladimir Putin, early Sunday morning, to release the images of the conquest “definitive” of Artiomovsk, the name of the city in Russian. An event “historical” almost a year to the day after the end of the battle of Mariupol, insisted the war correspondent of the first chain.

>>> “People call us to tell their pain”: in Ukraine, a hotline dedicated to the compensation of victims of war crimes

“Without exaggeration, this is a historic moment, says the reporter. Wagner fighters plant flags, a Russian flag and the flag of their company in the last street of Artyomovsk. From here it’s just fields, no more skyscrapers. The city is cleansed”. “Bakhmut nash”, “Bakhmout is ours,” shouted Wagner’s mercenaries, pointing to the field of ruins spreading out behind them. They retook the city after months of fierce fighting and probably at the cost of thousands of deaths.

Mercenaries suddenly much more visible on state television since the Kremlin announced that they would be decorated. Bakmhout’s victory is compared to the capture of Berlin by the Red Army in 1945. The Russian press speaks of a humiliating defeat for Ukraine, and asserts that the next objective is Slavyansk, about fifty kilometers to the north- west. But it also recognizes that the situation remains fragile in Bakhmout, still under the threat of encirclement.