Ukrainian troops have withdrawn from the frontline city of Avdiivka to avoid being encircled, new military chief Oleksandr Syrsky said Saturday, handing Russia its biggest symbolic victory following Kyiv's failed summer counter-offensive.



Avdiivka

Russian forces have invaded Ukraine from land, air and sea with strikes causing widespread damage. Global leaders have condemned the move and imposed sanctions.

Ukraine Invasion

Ukraine troops withdraw from frontline city of Avdiivka

Well, in the end, the statement was quite unequivocal coming from Oleksandr Sierski, the new commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. He said that they had withdrawn in order to preserve the health and the lives of servicemen. Similar announcements came from other commanders involved in the battle. They say that they got everybody out with minimal losses. There are a lot of different sources on Telegram, both Russian and Ukrainian, suggesting that that's not really the case, that, in fact, the losses were more significant and that the Ukrainians had to cross basically just a field about a kilometer and a half wide with no road or path along it in order to get out, the last ones coming out of Avdiivka city anyway, and that the losses were, in fact, significant and that wounded may have been left behind. Now, of course, one has to be very careful with this kind of information because it's exactly the kind of information that the Russians want to spread in order to suggest that the retreat was chaotic, that the Ukrainians are in disarray and everything. That's all part of the information warfare. But it does seem as though the Ukrainians were fighting in very, very difficult circumstances in the last few days in Avdiivka, outnumbered and outgunned. And different maps showing where the Russians were and how successful their attempts to encircle the settlement were do suggest that it will have been quite difficult for the Ukrainians to get out. And then what also was perhaps not predicted by many was this huge explosion at the Kokin Chemicals plant that was the largest of its kind in Europe. And Avdiivka's main factory, Ukrainian soldiers were held up in the bunkers there. But aerial bombardment led to an explosion that apparently sent chemicals, you know, very toxic chemicals all across the area. And so that scuppered the Ukrainians' chances, if they were thinking of doing that, of mounting a sort of last stand in the factory. And, Golivar, this has been described as Moscow's biggest victory, really, since Ukraine began its counteroffensive. Could it mark a turning point in the war, do you believe? Well, that's quite an interesting point in the sense that if this is the biggest victory, I mean, it's the biggest victory since the Russians took Bakhmut in May last year. So in not that far short of a year. And what have they managed to achieve? They've taken a town whose pre-war population was 30,000 and which is only 12 kilometres from Donetsk, the largest Russian-held city in eastern Ukraine. It's taken them this long to get that far from Donetsk. So the Ukrainians, in a sense, can be proud that their defence is held for as long as they did. But now the big question mark is, what do the defences beyond Avdiivka look like? There's been a lot of criticism and a lot of alarm bells ringing in Ukraine in recent days about the idea that the defences beyond Avdiivka have not been built strongly enough. And so we'll see in the coming days whether or not the Russians manage to advance very rapidly. But let's not forget that the Russians took huge losses, huge, tens more, thousands and thousands and thousands. And so probably they're not in very good fighting condition to start advancing rapidly towards the next towns either. Goliver, for now, thank you so much.

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Paris

Paris Olympics

French high speed train services remain disrupted after sabotage

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Palm Beach

U.S. Presidential Election

Israeli PM Netanyahu meets with Trump at Mar-a-Lago

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Jasper

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Taipei

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Climate Crisis

Thousands evacuated in China as Typhoon makes landfall

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El Paso

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Fujian

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Caracas

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Washington

Israel-Gaza War

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Miranda

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Dhaka

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Ukraine Invasion