Druzhkivka, Ukraine: Russian troops pursued their “relentless” shelling of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region on Saturday, as the United States promised new military aid to Kyiv including powerful rocket launchers.
Having endured long battles to capture cities in the neighbouring Lugansk region, Russia is now seeking to push deeper into Donetsk to consolidate its hold over the entire Donbas region.
Air raid sirens sounded overnight throughout the country’s east and south. Residents in the small town of Druzhkivka, south of the eastern Ukrainian industrial city of Kramatorsk, woke up to a suspected missile attack on Saturday which ripped apart a supermarket’s shop front and left a massive crater in front of the store.
“The entire frontline is under relentless shelling,” the head of the Donetsk military administration, Pavlo Kyrylenko, said in a Telegram message on Friday night.
He said the city of Sloviansk, on which Moscow’s troops have now set their sights, is being “shelled day and night”.
He also accused Russian forces of setting agricultural fields on fire, saying they were “trying to destroy the harvest by all means”. In a message on Saturday, he said five civilians had been killed the day before.
The governor of the Lugansk region, Sergiy Gaiday, said on Saturday the Russians were attacking Donetsk from their bases in Lugansk. “We are trying to contain their armed formations along the entire frontline… Where it is inconvenient for them to go forward, they create real hell, shelling the territories on the horizon,” he said.
Kyrylenko warned the Russians were in the process of replenishing their troops in the region to prepare for further assaults.
– ‘Terrorising cities’ –
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his nightly address he had spent the day on the frontlines in the eastern Dnipropetrovsk region, where he met civilian and military leaders.
“Officials must do not just everything possible, but much more than even possible, to guarantee people a normal standard of living even in such wartime conditions,” he said.
But in a Telegram message on Saturday, an official from the region’s military administration warned Russia had “intentionally shelled residential areas”, and had not stopped “terrorising” the cities and villages.
In the country’s south, the mayor of Mykolaiv begged citizens not to leave shelters, as he said explosions were heard throughout the night. Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk was quoted by Ukrainian media as urging people in occupied areas to evacuate by any means possible. “Massive fighting is going to happen,” she said.
– ‘Further evolution of support’ –
In a boost to Kyiv, Washington announced $400 million of further military aid, including a type of artillery ammunition with “greater precision” that has previously not been sent.
“It’s a further evolution in our support for Ukraine in this battle in the Donbas,” a senior defence official was quoted by the US Department of Defence as saying.
Also included in the aid package are four additional High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems to add to eight already in place.
