Russian advance in east pushes back Kyiv's forces

KYIV/POPASNA (Ukraine) • Russian forces in eastern Ukraine captured the centre of the railway hub town of Lyman and encircled most of Sievierodonetsk, Ukrainian officials acknowledged yesterday, as Kyiv's forces fell back in the face of Moscow's biggest advance in weeks.

Ukraine insisted its forces were still holding firm at new defensive lines in the eastern Donbas region, despite the apparent Russian advances on two of the major fronts there, battles that showed how momentum has shifted in recent days.

Moscow's separatist proxies said they were fully in control of Lyman, a railway hub that Russia has been attacking from the north in one of the main axes of its advance.

Ukrainian officials acknowledged that Russia had captured most of the town. But the Defence Ministry said forces were still holding out in the north-eastern and south-western districts, blocking the Russians from launching an advance towards Sloviansk, a major city a half-hour drive further south-west.

Farther east, Russian forces had encircled two-thirds of the city of Sievierodonetsk, Luhansk regional governor Serhiy Gaidai said. The city is the easternmost major population centre still held by Ukraine in the Donbas, and Russia has been trying to trap Ukraine's main fighting force inside it and its twin city Lysychansk across the Siverskiy Donets river.

Ninety per cent of the buildings in Sievierodonetsk were destroyed, Mr Gaidai said.

Mr Oleskiy Arestovych, an adviser to Ukraine's President, said in an interview overnight that Lyman had fallen, and that the well-organised Russian attack there showed Moscow's military was improving its tactics and operations.

After being driven back from the capital Kyiv in March and from the outskirts of the second-biggest city Kharkiv earlier this month, Russian forces are staging their strongest advance in weeks in the eastern Donbas region.

The advance has gained ground since Russian forces broke through Ukrainian lines south of Sievierodonetsk in the city of Popasna last week.

At least nine people were killed in shelling of Kharkiv, raising fears that Russia had not lost interest in the north-eastern hub, even after Ukraine took back control.

And around 10 people were killed in Russian strikes on a military facility in the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro, the regional head of the national guard said.

REUTERS, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE