The Ukrainian army announced on Sunday (19) that it had managed to stop Russian attacks near the eastern city of Severodonetsk, the scene of intense fighting for weeks in this war that, according to NATO, could last “years.” ”
“Our army is holding on,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday evening, at the beginning of a week he considers “historic” and in which 27 European Union countries will have to decide whether to grant Kiev the status of official candidate for integrate the block.
Earlier, the Ukrainian army reported on Facebook that it had managed to “stop the assault in the Toshkyvka region”, in the east of the country. “The enemy withdrew.”
Fighting is intensifying for now in the eastern Donbass basin, made up of Lugansk and Donetsk provinces, and partially controlled by pro-Russian separatists since 2014.
The city of Severodonetsk concentrates for now the fighting between Russian and Ukrainian troops and Moscow controls much of the city.
Serguii Gaidai, governor of Lugansk, region where Severodonetsk is located, called the statements, according to which Russia controls the entire locality, “lies” as “lies”.
“It’s true that they control most of the city, but not completely,” he pointed out.
From Moscow, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Sunday that “the offensive against Severodonetsk is being carried out successfully”.
“People’s militia units of the Lugansk People’s Republic, supported by the Russian Armed Forces, liberated the city of Metolkin,” southeast of Severodonetsk, the ministry reported to the press.
It also claimed to have hit a factory in Mikolaiv (south), which stored cruise missiles, and destroyed “ten 155 mm howitzers and up to twenty armored vehicles, supplied to the Kiev regime by the West in the last ten days”.
The claims could not be independently verified.
“There is no safe place”
After failing in its attempt to take Kiev at the start of the offensive on 24 February, Russia’s objective now appears to be to take full control of the Donbass mining basin, which comprises the Lugansk and Donetsk regions.
“There is no safe place,” admitted the governor in an interview with AFP from Lysychansk, in the Lugansk region. The Russians “bomb our positions 24 hours a day,” he described.
“There’s a saying: you have to prepare for the worst, and the best will come,” says Gaidai. “Of course we have to prepare ourselves”, reiterates the official, who fears that the Russians will surround the city and block the roads that guarantee supplies.
With a population of around 100,000 before the war, only 10% remain in Lysychansk.
And in the city, everything and everyone seems to be preparing for street fighting: soldiers are digging holes and laying barbed wire; the police put cars on fire to stop traffic; and many residents who were still there finally decide to leave.
“We dropped everything and left. No one can survive such an attack,” laments history teacher Alla Bor.
“We will not give the south to anyone”
On Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky expressed his determination to continue resisting in the south, after a visit to the cities of Mykolaiv and Odessa on Saturday.
Mikolaiv, which had half a million inhabitants before the war, remains under Ukrainian control, but is close to Kherson, a region practically occupied by the Russians.
In addition, it is on the highway leading to Odessa, Ukraine’s largest port, about 130 km to the southwest, where millions of tons of Ukrainian grain are blocked.
“We will not give the south to anyone. Let’s get it all back. The sea will be Ukrainian and it will be safe,” he promised, in a video posted on Telegram, after returning to the country’s capital Kiev.
“They are confident and, looking into their eyes, it is obvious that they do not doubt their victory,” added Zelensky, referring to his troops.
His optimism diverges, however, from the gloomy outlook presented by the secretary general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Jens Stoltenberg. In an interview published on Sunday by the German newspaper Bild, he assesses that the war could last “years” and, therefore, Western countries must prepare for lasting support for Ukraine.
“We have to be prepared for this to last for years,” Stoltenberg said.
“We must not waver in our support for Ukraine, even if the costs are high, not only in terms of military support, but also in rising energy and food prices,” he added.
Russia this week reduced the flow of gas to western Europe, citing technical problems. Germany, at the forefront, announced urgent measures on Sunday to secure its energy supply and these will mean turning more to coal.
“It’s bitter, but it’s indispensable to reduce gas consumption,” Economy Minister Robert Habeck said in a statement. The German coalition government has promised to stop using coal by 2030.
The Austrian government has announced that it will reopen a decommissioned coal plant due to reduced deliveries of Russian gas.
With the Verbund group, the country’s main electricity supplier, “it was agreed to reactivate the thermal plant” in Mellach (south), currently closed, the chancellery announced in a statement published after a crisis meeting.
The objective is “that in an emergency, it can again produce electricity from coal”, continues the document.
The process will take several months, the Austrian environment ministry said.
Meanwhile, Qatar announced the merger of Italian group ENI with French company TotalEnergies in the North Field East project, which aims to increase the Gulf country’s liquefied natural gas production by 60% by 2027.
