The battle for Sievierodonetsk is still raging. Ukraine assured, Sunday, June 5, that its forces controlled the “half” of this key city in the east of its territory and the current epicenter of fierce fighting in the vast coal-mining region of Donbass.
Here is what to remember from this new day of combat.
“Half” of Sievierodonetsk is under the control of the Ukrainian army
kyiv claims to regain ground in this city of Donbass. “Our armed forces have cleaned up half” of this industrial center of the Russian troops which were there, declared the governor of the area of Luhansk, Sergiï Gaïdaï, in an interview diffused on the social networks. “Half the city is under the control of our defenders”he added.
New strikes against kyiv
Several Russian airstrikes targeting railway infrastructure shook kyiv at dawn on Sunday, the first since the end of April. Four missiles hit the Darnytsia wagon repair plant in southeast kyiv, said Olexander Kamyshin, head of Ukraine’s state-owned railway company Ukrzaliznytsia. According to him, the factory does not deal with military equipment, but repairs wagons carrying exported grain.
Russia said on Sunday it destroyed armor supplied to Ukraine by Eastern European countries in airstrikes on kyiv, the first in several weeks. “High-precision, long-range missiles fired by the Russian Aerospace Forces at the outskirts of kyiv destroyed T-72 tanks supplied by Eastern European countries and other armored vehicles that were in the hangars of a car repair business” railways, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.
Putin threatens to attack new targets
Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that Moscow will hit new targets if the West supplies long-range missiles to Ukraine, saying current arms shipments are aimed at “prolong the conflict”. If long-range missiles are delivered to Ukraine, “then we will draw the appropriate conclusions and use our weapons (…) to hit sites that we have not targeted so far”said Vladimir Putin, according to excerpts from an interview to be published on Sunday evening on the Rossiya-1 television channel.
kyiv calls for ‘constant’ Western support
Ukraine needs military support “constant” from Western countries and not from aid “punctual”until its victory against the forces of Moscow, declared Sunday its deputy defense minister, Ganna Malyar. “We have already entered a protracted war and we will need constant support. The West must understand that its help cannot be one-off but must continue until we win”Ganna Malyar told local media.