War in Ukraine The Russian group Wagner claims the "legal" seizure of Bakhmut

The Russian paramilitary group Wagner claimed on Monday to have taken "in a legal sense" the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, where Moscow has sustained the longest battle, and to have occupied the City Hall building

War in Ukraine The Russian group Wagner claims the "legal" seizure of Bakhmut

The Russian paramilitary group Wagner claimed on Monday to have taken "in a legal sense" the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, where Moscow has sustained the longest battle, and to have occupied the City Hall building.

Wagner has backed Russian troops in their offensive to encircle Bakhmut, a site that both Ukraine and Russia have invested enormous efforts in despite analysts deeming it of little strategic value.

"In a legal sense, Bakhmut has been taken. The enemy is concentrated in the western areas," Yevgeny Prigozhin said on his Telegram channel.

On March 20, Prigozhin said that Wagner was already in control of 70% of the city.

However, hours before Prigozhin's announcement, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine posted on Facebook that "the enemy has not stopped their assault on Bakhmut. However, the Ukrainian defenders are bravely holding the city by repelling numerous attacks." .

Also on Sunday night, President Volodymyr Zelensky praised the current defense by Ukrainian troops in the city, most of which is in ruins.

"I am grateful to our warriors who are fighting near Avdiivka, Marinka, near Bakhmut (...) Especially in Bakhmut! Today it is especially hot there," Zelensky said in a Telegram post.

Also on Sunday, just about 27 kilometers from Bakhmut, in Konstantinovka, Russian bombardments left six dead - three men and three women - and eleven wounded, the Ukrainian authorities announced.

Police claimed that Russia carried out a "massive attack" in the morning, involving a total of six S-300 and Hurricane missiles.

"Sixteen apartment buildings, eight private residences, a kindergarten, an administrative building, three cars and a gas pipeline" were affected, it added.

Lilia, a 19-year-old psychology student and resident of one of the damaged buildings, was "shocked." "I am very lucky not to have been home at the moment," she told Afp.

Russia "continues to concentrate the bulk of its efforts on offensive actions in the Lyman, Bakhmut Avdiivka and Marinka sectors," the Ukrainian Army General Staff reported in the afternoon, assuring that "numerous enemy attacks against Bakhmut" had been repelled.

The attack in Bakhmut happened on the same day that President Zelensky marked the anniversary of the Bucha massacre, where he praised how the Ukrainian resistance resisted "the greatest force against humanity" in modern times.

The town, a northern suburb of kyiv, became a symbol of the atrocities attributed to the invading troops.

kyiv estimates the number of civilians killed in the district during the Russian occupation at "more than 1,400", including 37 children.

Moscow denies any involvement in the deaths of the civilians and claims that it was a "staging" by kyiv and its allies.

"We will liberate all our lands. We will put the Ukrainian flag back in all our cities and towns," Zelensky added.

Russia controls more than 18% of the Ukrainian territory.

"Russian evil will fall, precisely here in Ukraine, and it will no longer be able to rise," he declared together with the prime ministers of Croatia, Slovakia and Slovenia and the president of Moldova.

The anniversary of the finding of the Bucha massacre comes at a time of little progress or setbacks on the front, which stretches from the east to the south of the country.

Since the beginning of the year, the troops in Moscow hardly claimed any progress. The few that were recorded occurred around Bakhmut, in the eastern Donbas basin, partially occupied by pro-Russian separatist forces since 2014.

The Russian army cannot so far break through the Ukrainian defenses, reinforced by Western weapons.

In Russia, a prominent Russian military blogger and ardent supporter of the military offensive in Ukraine was killed Sunday in a bombing at a cafe in the city of St. Petersburg.

Vladlen Tatarsky was killed when a rigged gift containing a bomb exploded, at an event organized by the Cyber ​​Front Z group, which refers to itself online as "Russia's information troops." Another 25 people were injured.

"Russian journalists constantly feel the threat of reprisals from the kyiv regime," reacted the Russian Foreign Ministry, assuring that Vladlen Tatarsky was "dangerous" for Ukraine.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project