Ukraine signalled on Friday that its troops were withdrawing from Sievierodonetsk, the site of weeks of intense bombardment and street fighting, a move that would be a significant setback in its battle against Russian forces.
Serhiy Gaidai, the provincial governor, said troops in the city had already received orders to relocate, but he did not specify whether they had done so or where they were going.
‘Remaining in positions that have been smashed to pieces over many months just to stay there makes no sense,’ Gaidai said on Ukrainian television.
He stated that the troops would ‘have to be withdrawn.’
Gaidai was speaking on the four-month anniversary of Russian President Vladimir Putin sending tens of thousands of troops across the border, sparking a conflict that has killed thousands of combatants and civilians, displaced several million people, and seen Ukrainian cities blasted to smithereens by Russian artillery and air strikes.
Some of the most intense fighting of the war has occurred in Sievierodonetsk, where street-by-street combat has raged for a month, with Russia gradually gaining ground.
- The battle is critical for Russia to retake control of the last Ukrainian-held sliver of Luhansk province, which, along with Donetsk, forms the Donbas region, Ukraine’s industrial heartland.
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