Heavy blow to the Ukrainian resistance. After a month of siege with street fighting and bombardments on Severodonetsk, the Ukrainian Army has ordered its troops to withdraw from this key city for the control of the Luhansk province and the entire eastern Donbass region.
The governor of Luhansk, Serhiy Gaidai, announced this Friday that the Ukrainian troops “have already received the order” to withdraw from Severodonetsk, at whose gates the Russian and pro-Russian forces arrived on May 26. “It no longer makes sense to stay in positions that have been constantly bombarded for months,” he added. The city has been “almost reduced to rubble” by continuous shelling, he added. “All essential infrastructure has been destroyed. 90% of the city is damaged, 80% of the houses will have to be destroyed,” he reported.
Kyiv already only controlled the Azot industrial plant in the administrative city of Lugansk, where more than 500 civilians and an unknown number of Ukrainian defenders are taking refuge. Pro-Russians believe there are about 2,500 soldiers and mercenaries at the chemical plant. The governor of Luhansk has not specified when or how the soldiers will withdraw from Severodonetsk, nor what their number is.
As the Ukrainians feared when they had to withdraw from a highway near Lisichansk for fear of being surrounded, pro-Russian troops from the self-proclaimed republic of Luhansk (recognized only by Moscow) have taken three other towns near Lisichansk in recent hours, which it is now the last major city in the province under Kyiv’s control.
Gaidai affirmed this Friday that “the Russians captured Mykolayivka”, 12 kilometers southwest of Lisichansk. However, Ukrainian troops managed to stop the Russian offensive near Borivske, south of Severodonetsk and east of Lisichansk, the General Staff of Ukraine confirmed in its morning report today.
“The enemy’s offensive near Borivske was successfully stopped. In addition, our soldiers repulsed the offensive in the direction of the southern outskirts of Lisichansk, inflicted losses and were forced to retreat,” Gaidai wrote in his Telegram.
According to an officer of the separatist militias, Andréi Marochko, the pro-Russian forces also took the towns of Hirske and Zolote south of Lisichansk, the latter city they already entered at the end of the day on Thursday. “The Ukrainian group located in the Hirske-Zolote fence has been eliminated. All settlements are under our control,” he said, according to the official TASS agency.
On Wednesday, Ukraine acknowledged that it had also lost control of Loskutivka and Rai-Oleksandrivka, about 20 kilometers southwest of Lisichansk.
