Moscow has abandoned its main stronghold in northeastern Ukraine in a sudden collapse of one of the main front lines of the war after Ukrainian forces rapidly advanced.
Key Points:
- Ukraine’s foreign minister said the developments show that Ukraine can defeat Russia
- Russian forces had used Izium as a logistics base
- The head of the Russian administration in Kharkiv told residents to evacuate the province
Ukrainian forces pushed up to 50 kilometers beyond Russian lines this week and retook dozens of towns in a dramatic counteroffensive.
The rapid fall of three key cities — Izium, Kupiansk and Balaklyia — in Kharkiv province was Moscow’s worst defeat since its troops were forced out of the capital Kyiv in March.
Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said the arms supply from the West is paying off.
“We have shown that we can defeat the Russian army,” he said.
“I repeat again the more weapons we get the faster we win, the faster this war will be over and we can focus on other goals.”
Russian forces had fought hard to capture Izium earlier in the war. (AP: Ministry of Defense of Ukraine)
This could be a decisive turning point in the 6-month war, with thousands of Russian soldiers abandoning stockpiles of ammunition and equipment as they fled.
Russian forces used Izium as a logistics base for one of their main campaigns: a months-long assault from the north into the adjacent Donbas region, made up of Donetsk and Luhansk.
Ukrainian soldiers hold a flag on the roof of Kupiansk. (Reuters: Telegram @kuptg)
Russian state news agency TASS quoted the Defense Ministry as saying it had ordered troops to leave the area and strengthen operations elsewhere in neighboring Donetsk.
The head of Russia’s administration in Kharkiv told residents to evacuate the province and flee to Russia to “save lives,” TASS reported.
Witnesses described traffic jams with people leaving Russian-held territory.
Advances cut Russian supply lines
Space for play or pause, M for mute, left and right arrows for search, up and down arrows for volume. Clock duration: 3min 37sec 3m 37s Ukraine launches a successful counter-offensive in the north-east of the country.
The Russian withdrawal was announced by Ukrainian leaders.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a video address on Saturday that Ukraine’s armed forces had liberated about 2,000 square kilometers of territory since a counteroffensive against Russia began earlier this month, he said.
Ukrainian officials stopped short of confirming that they had retaken Izium, but Andriy Yermak, Zelenskyy’s chief of staff, posted a photo of troops outside it and tweeted a grape emoji. The name of the city means “raisin”.
The Russian army claimed the title of “fastest army in the world…keep running!” Yermak later wrote on Twitter.
The announcement of the Russian withdrawal came hours after Ukrainian troops captured the northernmost town of Kupiansk, the only rail hub supplying Russia’s entire front line in northeastern Ukraine.
Ukrainian officials posted early Saturday of their troops raising the country’s blue and yellow flag in front of the Kupiansk town hall.
This left thousands of Russian troops abruptly cut off from supplies along a front that has seen some of the most intense battles of the war.
There were signs of trouble for Russia elsewhere along its remaining positions on the Eastern Front, and pro-Russian officials acknowledged difficulties elsewhere.
Ukrainian armed forces continue to advance in different areas of the front, Zelenskyy said.
“Russia withdraws”
The nearby village of Vasylenkove was also liberated by Ukrainian forces. (AP: Press Service of the Territorial Defense of the Armed Forces of Ukraine)
A witness in Valuyki, a town in Russia’s Belgorod region near the border with Ukraine, said he saw families from Kupiansk eating and sleeping in their cars along the roads.
“Today I was in the market and I saw a lot of people from Kupiansk. They say that half of the city was taken by the Ukrainian army and Russia is retreating… the fight is getting closer,” the witness said.
Belgorod Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said officials were giving food and medical aid to people queuing at a checkpoint in Russia.
Senator Andrey Turchak of the pro-Kremlin United Russia party reported more than 400 vehicles at the border.
Russian rockets hit the city of Kharkiv on Saturday evening, killing at least one person and damaging several houses, as part of an increase in shelling since Kyiv’s counteroffensive, Ukrainian authorities said.
Neither account of the battlefield could be independently verified.
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There were signs that Ukraine might take advantage of the disorder with assaults along other areas of the eastern front.
Denis Pushilin, head of the separatist administration installed by Russia in Donetsk province, said the situation in Liman, east of Izium, “is being quite difficult, as in a number of settlements in north of the republic”.
A little further east, Ukrainian officials hinted at a possible attempt to retake Lysychansk, which Moscow seized in July after weeks of fighting in one of the bloodiest battles of the war.
Ukraine’s regional governor, Serhiy Gaidai, was quoted in the media as saying that Ukrainian troops had been seen on the outskirts of the city.
The city’s name means “fox”, and after his grapevine tweet, Andriy Yermak, Mr Zelenskyy’s chief of staff, tweeted a fox emoji.
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