Ukrainian forces have withdrawn from parts of a long-fought eastern city, highlighting the challenge facing Kyiv’s troops as Russia intensifies its offensive and US military aid is slow to arrive.
Russia’s army has been focused on the hilltop city of Chasiv Yar since capturing Avdiivka, an industrial city further south, in February. Moscow has deployed tens of thousands of troops around Chasiv Yar in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, which Russian President Vladimir Putin has claimed to have annexed along with three other regions that are only under his army’s partial control.
Ukrainian officials said holding part of Chasiv Yar “became impractical”. They ordered the retreat from a neighbourhood across a canal “after the enemy entered it, because it threatened the lives and health of our servicemen and the positions of our defenders were destroyed”, said Ukrainian military spokesperson Nazar Voloshyn on Thursday.