Jan 8 (Reuters) – Russian shelling of regions in eastern Ukraine killed at least two people overnight, local authorities said on Sunday, after Moscow ended a self-declared Christmas ceasefire and went commit to continue the fight until a victory is achieved over his neighbor. .
President Vladimir Putin ordered a 36-hour ceasefire along the contact line from midday on Friday to observe Russia’s and Ukraine’s Orthodox Christmas, which fell on Saturday.
Ukraine rejected the truce, and the general staff of Ukraine’s armed forces said Russian troops had shelled dozens of positions and settlements along the front line on Saturday.
A 50-year-old man was killed in the northeastern Kharkiv region as a result of Russian shelling overnight, Oleh Synehubov, the region’s governor, said on the Telegram messaging app. The news came minutes after midnight in Moscow. One person was killed in another overnight attack in Soledar, eastern Donetsk region, local authorities said.
Reuters could not immediately verify this.
Most Ukrainian Orthodox Christians have traditionally celebrated Christmas on January 7, as have Orthodox Christians in Russia. But this year, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, the country’s largest, also allowed a celebration on December 25. Still, many observed the Sabbath holiday and gathered in churches and cathedrals.
The Kremlin said Moscow will continue what it calls a “special military operation” in Ukraine, an invasion it launched on February 24 that Kyiv and its Western allies call an unprovoked aggression to seize land.
“The tasks set by the president (Putin) for the special military operation will still be fulfilled,” Russian state news agency TASS said, citing Putin’s first deputy chief of staff, Sergei Kiriyenko.
“And there will definitely be a win.”
The war has killed tens of thousands and displaced millions of Ukrainians.
Ukrainian officials reported explosions in the regions that make up the wider Donbas region, the frontline of the war where fighting has been going on for months.
Pavlo Kyrylenko, the governor of Donetsk, said there were nine missile attacks in the region overnight, including seven in the battered city of Kramatorsk.
Explosions were also heard in the city of Zaporizhzhia, the administrative center of the Zaporizhzhia region, a local official said, giving no immediate reports of damage or casualties.
Gunfire echoed Saturday around the nearly deserted streets of Bakhmut, an eastern city that is currently the focus of the heaviest fighting.
Serhiy Haidai, the governor of Luhansk in eastern Ukraine, told television that there was heavy fighting in the region and that Russian forces had deployed their most combat-ready units and heavy equipment to the city of Kriminna that they occupy, which he said meant the Russians were. slowly receding into the region.
With nighttime temperatures dropping to 15-17 degrees Celsius (5 to 1 Fahrenheit), fighting activity would soon increase as hard frosts make it easier to move heavy equipment, Haidai added.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Wednesday that Russia is planning a major new offensive. The Pentagon said Friday that Putin’s goal of seizing Ukrainian territory has not changed, even as his military continues to take hits.
There have been growing concerns that Belarus, a staunch supporter of Moscow, could be used as a springboard to attack Ukraine from the north following increased military activity in the country and the new move of Russian troops there.
Unofficial Telegram channels monitoring military activity in Belarus reported late Saturday that some 1,400-1,600 Russian soldiers arrived from Russia in the northeastern Belarusian city of Vitebsk over the past two days.
Reuters could not independently verify the information.
Reporting by Lidia Kelly, David Ljuggren and Pavel Polityuk Writing by Lidia Kelly and Pavel Polityuk Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore and Frances Kerry
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