The entrance to the city of Izium, Ukraine, is seen on September 10. (Telegram @Tsaplienko/Reuters)
Saturday’s rapid advance did not end Izium, as Ukraine appeared to have opened a new front against Russian defenses on the border of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
The head of the Luhansk regional military administration, Serhiy Hayday, indicated that the city of Lysychansk was the target of the new offensive.
Lysychansk was the last city in eastern Ukraine’s Luhansk region to fall under Russian control in July, after weeks of intense fighting. Hayday told CNN on Saturday that “the occupants, including both collaborators and military personnel, are fleeing in a hurry.”
“Locals have videos and photos to prove it,” Hayday said. He said the visual evidence could not be shared for security reasons.
“Those from Svatove, Starobilsk and Novopskov are trying to leave, not to Luhansk, but to the border with Russia in Milove,” he added.
CNN can’t verify Hayday’s claim, but at least one border crossing in Russia has seen lines of vehicles forming.
Hayday also told CNN that the Russians had failed to build a defensive line in Luhansk. “Svatove, Starobilsk – this is open countryside, so there’s nowhere to hide.”
He claimed that Russian forces were leaving the town of Svatove. If true, it would be significant, as Svatove is a key link in Russian supply lines to parts of the occupied Luhansk region.
In another sign of Ukrainian developments, the head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, Denis Pushilin, admitted that the situation in northern Donetsk had become “quite tough”.
Pushilin said on his Telegram channel that in the city of Lyman, not far from the Ukrainian-controlled city of Sloviansk, “the situation is quite tough, just like in a number of settlements in the north of the Republic.” I am in contact with the local administrations, with the emergency services and with our units. There is more information but at the moment I cannot reveal it, as it could harm our units,” he said.