January 29, 2023
Ukrainian tank crews have arrived in Britain to begin training for their continued fight against Russia, the British Defense Ministry said on January 29, just days after Britain and other NATO countries pledged more than 130 tanks to Ukraine.
“The UK will provide Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine alongside global partner nations — demonstrating the strength of support for Ukraine, internationally,” the ministry tweeted on January 29.
The United States and Germany agreed last week to send Abrams and Leopard 2 tanks, respectively, to Ukraine, while the United Kingdom earlier in January said it would send 14 Challenger 2 tanks. Germany also allowed other countries, such as Norway and Poland, to send their German-made Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine.
Poland said it will provide 60 more tanks to Ukraine, in addition to the 14 it has already pledged.
Ukrainian authorities have repeatedly said that they need 300 tanks as they seek to drive Russian forces from their territory. Ukraine has lost more than half of its 850 tanks during the 11-month war, according to Oryx, a website that uses open-source tools to count destroyed equipment.
Russia has many more tanks than Ukraine, but their models are inferior in some key respects to Western models.
Both Russia and Ukraine are expected to launch offensives in the coming weeks, with tanks expected to play a vital role in those battles, experts said.
Meanwhile, the fighting on the front line remains intense, especially in eastern Donetsk region, with major battles under way for Vuhledar and Bakhmut, a town that has been virtually razed by repeated Russian artillery bombardments.
The head of the Donetsk regional military administration, Pavlo Kyrylenko, said on January 29 that four people were killed and 17 others wounded in Russian strikes on Bakhmut and Kostyantynivka the previous day.
In the southern province of Kherson, authorities said Russian strikes targeted civilian infrastructure in the Beryslav district over the past 24 hours, damaging several houses and farm buildings.
The Ukrainian Health Ministry later said one nurse was injured when a hospital in the city of Kherson was damaged in a Russian military attack.
There were no casualties among the civilian populations as the district’s administrative center, Beryslav, and the villages of Mylove and Tyahynka came under the Russian attack, the district chief, Volodymyr Litvinov, said on Telegram on January 29.
Ukraine’s military, meanwhile, said its forces repelled an attack in the area of Blahodatne in the eastern part of the Donetsk region, while Russia’s Vagner mercenary group claimed it had taken control of the village.