Vladimir Putin’s forces are “struggling to break through” Ukrainian defences despite deploying thousands of troops for an advance in part of the Donbas region, British defence chiefs said on Wednesday.
They stressed that the Russian president had sent 22 battalion tactical groups, each with about 900 troops, to the Izyum area.
But they were being limited in their attempts to “build momentum” in their attack.
The operation is believed to be aimed at creating a “staging post” to try to cut off some of Ukraine’s best trained and best equipped forces which have been fighting Moscow-backed separatists in the region since 2014.
In its latest intelligence briefing, the Ministry of Defence in London said: “Russia has deployed 22 battalion tactical groups near Izyum in its attempt to advance along the northern axis of the Donbas.
“Despite struggling to break through Ukrainian defences and build momentum, Russia highly likely intends to proceed beyond Izyum to capture the cities of Kramatorsk and Severodonetsk.
“Capturing these locations would consolidate Russian military control of the north-eastern Donbas and provide a staging point for their efforts to cut-off Ukrainian forces in the region.”
Russian forces pounded targets in eastern Ukraine on Tuesday, unleashing rockets on the sprawling Azovstal steel plant that is Ukraine’s last redoubt in the besieged southern port city of Mariupol as the European Union prepared to slap oil sanctions on Moscow.
Russian attacks in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk province killed 21 civilians and injured 27 on Tuesday, regional governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said in an online post.
Andriy Sadoviy, the mayor of Lviv, a western Ukrainian city near the Polish border, said late on Tuesday that air strikes had damaged power stations, cutting off electricity in some districts.
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Russia also struck a military airfield near Ukraine’s southwestern city of Odesa with missiles, destroying drones, missiles and ammunition supplied to Ukraine by the United States and its European allies, the defence ministry in Moscow said.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told how the US and Britain, as well as other allies, are working together to give Ukraine military, economic, diplomatic and humanitarian support against the Russian invasion which started on February 24.
He tweeted early on Wednesday: “Spoke with @trussliz (Foreign Secretary Liz Truss) today to reaffirm support for the people of Ukraine, who bravely defend against the Kremlin’s brutal war. “Our coordinated assistance to Ukraine continues, and we will hold accountable those who continue to enable Putin’s efforts.”
