- Zelenskiy says forces have retaken towns and villages
- Blinken visits Kyiv with new US aid package
Kyiv, Sept 9 (Reuters) – Ukrainian forces charged across an expanding swath of formerly Russian-held territory in the east on Friday after breaking through the front line in a surprise breakthrough that could mark a tipping point important turning point in the war.
After remaining silent for a day, Moscow effectively acknowledged that a section of its front line had collapsed southeast of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city.
“The very fact of a violation of our defenses is already a substantial victory for the Ukrainian armed forces,” said the head of the Moscow-based administration for the occupied areas in Kharkiv province, Vitaliy Ganchev, on Russian state television.
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Ganchev later said his administration was trying to evacuate civilians from towns like Izium, Russia’s main stronghold and logistical base in the province, near the eastern front.
The Russian defense ministry released a video of military vehicles speeding down a road, saying they showed reinforcements rushing to defend the area. The Kremlin declined to comment on the Ukrainian breakthrough.
Ukrainian officials released a parade of videos showing soldiers raising flags and standing in front of street signs in towns and cities in a swath of territory formerly controlled by Russia.
A viral image showed troops holding a Ukrainian flag at a welcome sign on the highway through Kupiansk, previously more than 50km inside Russia’s front line. The city is a vital strategic objective as the junction of several of the main railway lines supplying Russian troops at the front.
Ukraine kept independent journalists out of the area and Reuters could not confirm the images, but President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said troops had “liberated dozens of settlements” and retaken more than 1,000 square kilometers (385 square miles) in the eastern Kharkiv and southern Kherson regions.
Western military analysts say the advance could shut down supply lines that Moscow has relied on to maintain its hold on eastern Ukraine and potentially leave thousands of Russian troops encircled.
SUCCESS
Such rapid advances have been largely unseen since Russia abandoned its assault on Kyiv in March, turning the war primarily into a relentless movement along entrenched front lines.
“Now we see successes in Kherson, we see some successes in Kharkiv and that is very, very encouraging,” US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told a news conference with his Czech counterpart in Prague.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who pledged additional military aid to Ukraine on Thursday during a visit to Kyiv, said on Friday: “Fundamentally, they (Ukrainians) are fighting for their own land. They are fighting for their future . Russian forces in Ukraine are not. And I am convinced that that is the most decisive factor. And we are seeing some manifestations of that.”
Firefighters work at the site of a residential building hit by a Russian military strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kharkiv, Ukraine, September 6, 2022. REUTERS/Sofiia Gatilova/File Photo
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The Ukrainian General Staff said early Friday that retreating Russian forces were trying to evacuate wounded personnel and damaged military equipment near Kharkiv.
“Thanks to skillful and coordinated actions, the Armed Forces of Ukraine, with the support of the local population, advanced almost 50 km in three days.”
Tens of thousands of people have died, millions have been driven from their homes and Russian forces have destroyed entire cities since Moscow launched what it calls a “special military operation” in February to “disarm” Ukraine. Russia denies intentionally targeting civilians.
In the latest reported strike against civilians, Ukrainian officials said Russia had fired across the border, hitting a hospital in the northeastern Sumy region on Friday morning, destroying the building and wounding people. Reuters could not independently confirm the report.
The center of Kharkiv, which has been regularly bombed by Russia, was hit by Russian rocket fire, injuring 10 people, including three children, Governor Oleh Synehubov said. Rockets hit a children’s art center and a school, as well as private homes, Mayor Ihor Terekhov wrote on Telegram.
ADVANCEMENT
Ukraine’s stunning advance in the east came a week after Kyiv announced the start of a long-awaited counter-offensive hundreds of kilometers away at the other end of the front line in Kherson province , to the south.
Ukrainian officials say Russia moved thousands of troops south to respond to the Kherson advance, leaving other parts of the front exposed and creating the opportunity for the blitzkrieg.
“We found a weak point where the enemy was not prepared,” presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said in a video posted on YouTube.
So far, less information has emerged about the campaign in the south, with Ukraine keeping reporters away and providing few details.
Ukraine has been using new Western-supplied artillery and rockets to pound Russian rear positions, aiming to trap thousands of Russian troops on the west bank of the wide Dnipro River and cut them off from supplies.
Arestovych recognized that progress in the south had not yet been as rapid as the sudden advance in the east.
Russian state news agency RIA quoted Russian-appointed Kherson authorities as saying some Ukrainian troops were captured during the counterattack and some Polish tanks they were using were destroyed. Reuters could not verify these reports.
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Reporting by Reuters journalists Writing by Peter Graff Editing by Philippa Fletcher
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