Ukraine gains ground in Shevyerodonetsk, and Russians refuse to fight | Abroad

There has been a fight for control of Shevyerodonetsk since the beginning of the invasion on February 24. It is the administrative capital of Luhansk Province and thus important for the control of the area. It is now the easternmost major city in the greater Donbas region that has not yet been conquered by the Russians. Ukraine reports that significant territorial gains have even been made in recent days. “Not so long ago, Russia controlled 70 percent of the city,” said Serhiy Gaidai, the head of the province, on television last night. “That was a difficult situation. But now we have recovered 20 percent of that.”

According to Gaidai, the Russian troops continue to attack, but they are always stopped. “This is how they do it, step by step, destroying everything with their artillery, planes, mortars. As soon as we have enough Western long-range weapons, we can push their artillery back. And then the Russian infantry will take off, believe me.”

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin announced last night that the Russian capital will help rebuild the cities of Luhansk and Donetsk. He said that after visiting the area. Luhansk and Donetsk log into the “people’s republics” of the same name, which have been declared independent by Russian separatists. “On behalf of the President of Russia, Moscow will offer not only humanitarian aid, but also help to restore social and industrial infrastructure,” he wrote on Telegram. “We want to restore normal life.”

According to him, there are already about 1,500 Moscow municipal experts in Luhansk, with a large amount of equipment. They have started building schools and houses, among other things. “The plans also include improving the road network, the stadium and the city park. It is important to quickly repair the damage from the hostilities and prepare the city for autumn and winter.”

Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky commemorated the centenary of the war in his late night speech. In his speech, he said the invasion has radically changed the use of words in his country. For example, some words have been given a different meaning, while new words have also been added, according to the president. “A hundred days, a hundred words,” he said, reflecting on the past period. ‘Justice’, ‘heroes’, ‘reconstruction’, ‘security’ and ‘liberation’ are words that keep the country afloat and give hope, he says. He ended with the three most important words as far as he’s concerned: “Peace, victory and Ukraine.”

The BBC comes with a remarkable story about Russian soldiers who refuse to return to Ukraine to fight. Russian human rights lawyers and activists report that the soldiers were scarred by their experiences at the front during the beginning of the invasion. It would now be hundreds of men who have asked for legal help.

The BBC spoke to one of them, Sergei (not his real name), who fought in Ukraine for five weeks earlier this year: “I don’t want to go back to kill and be killed.” He says he was traumatized by what he went through. “We are the Russian army, I thought, the largest and best in the world. But we were like blind kitties. We didn’t even have night vision goggles or other standard equipment. I am shocked. It doesn’t cost that much to rest us well, does it? Why didn’t that happen?”

Sergei says he was sent to the border with Ukraine in January for an exercise. A month later, on the first day of the invasion, his unit had to cross the border and was immediately fired upon. The commander said, “Well, you’ve already noticed, this is no joke.” Sergei was shocked, he says: “I thought: is this really happening?” They were constantly under fire. In his unit of fifty men (almost everyone under the age of 25), ten were killed and ten injured. He heard stories of soldiers who were so inexperienced that they couldn’t even “tell the front and back of a mortar.”

His unit advanced with no clear strategy, he says. No reinforcements arrived and the soldiers were not equipped to take a large city. The latter would have been the commanders’ plan. They thought that the Ukrainians would surrender soon. “We didn’t even have helicopters, and we rode in a motorcade, as if we were going to a parade. We sent no scouts ahead, nor did we have a rear guard to protect us if we were attacked from behind. Many of our soldiers have died as a result. If we had slowed down, we could have cleared the roads and saved a lot of losses.”

According to the BBC Sergei is not the only one with complaints like this: the same stories emerge from intercepted telephone conversations between soldiers and their families. When he had to go back to the front after a short rest, he refused. “My commander didn’t even try to persuade me. He said I was not the first.” Together with two comrades, he approached a lawyer who advised them to surrender their weapons and return to their unit headquarters. There they had to write a letter declaring that they were ‘morally and psychologically exhausted’ and could therefore no longer fight. If he didn’t, it would be considered desertion.

According to human rights lawyer Alexei Tabalov, Russian law allows such denials. A sizable minority of the soldiers who took part in the invasion would have refused to go back. Independent Russian media report hundreds of cases.