The founder of the private Russian mercenary group Wagner has said that the force has taken Krasna Hora, a village in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region that lies on the edge of Bakhmut, a key objective for Russian forces.
“Today the settlement of Krasna Hora was taken by the assault troops of the Wagner private military company,” Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozhin said in an audio message posted on Telegram on February 12.
A separate post showed what appeared to be Wagner fighters at the entrance to Krasna Hora. RFE/RL was unable to verify Prigozhin’s claim that Wagner had occupied the village, which had a prewar population of some 600 people.
Russian forces, boosted by Wagner, have made the strategic city of Bakhmut a key objective of their offensive in Ukraine’s east. Prigozhin on February 12 vowed that Wagner would take the city, which sits along several important highways and has been under assault for months.
Kyiv is convinced that after months of setbacks Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to highlight battlefield success before the first anniversary of his unprovoked invasion later this month.
Prigozhin said on February 10 that Russian forces must capture Bakhmut for the campaign to succeed but face fierce resistance from Ukrainian forces.
British intelligence, in an assessment of Ukrainian military statistics claiming Russian forces had suffered more than 820 casualties per day for the past two weeks, said those figures would indicate the highest Russian losses since the first week of its invasion of Ukraine that began on February 24.
The assessment attributed the high number of Russian casualties to the lack of trained personnel, coordination, and resources, and cited the Russian effort to take Bakhmut as an example.
The Ukrainian military reported on February 12 that it had repulsed 11 attacks by Russian forces in the eastern Luhansk and Donetsk regions over the previous 24 hours.
Russia’s military said on February 11 that it had carried out a “massive strike” with missiles and drones on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure and that it had blocked rail and land routes used to deliver Western weaponry to Ukrainian forces.
The strikes led to power cuts in many cities and towns, although Ukrainian officials expressed optimism that Kyiv and regions in the south and west of the country would be able to avoid power losses.
With reporting by Reuters
https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-russia-wagner-prigozhin-krasna-hora-bakhmut/32267558.html
“Kyiv is convinced that after months of setbacks Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to highlight battlefield success before the first anniversary of his unprovoked invasion later this month.”
Six months of fighting, at the the cost of 1000s of orcs lives, and Putler is going to portray the capture of a hamlet as a mighty success.
Such dismal performance must be most bitter for the roaches.
wags taking a picture by a sign does not mean they control it.