By John
Psaropoulos, MARIUPOL Ukraine
Ukraine moved on the
counteroffensive during week 11 of Russia’s war, taking back towns to the north
and east of the second-largest
city Kharkiv.Ukrainian service members walk among debris of damaged buildings after a Russian attack in Kharkiv, Ukraine
According to some news
reports, Russian forces retreated to regroup around defensive positions less
than 10km (6 miles) from the Russian border, with Ukrainian units in hot
pursuit.
“This Ukrainian operation is
developing into a successful, broader counteroffensive – as opposed to the more
localised counterattacks that Ukrainian forces have conducted throughout the
war to secure key terrain and disrupt Russian offensive operations,” said
the Institute for the Study of War.
“Ukrainian forces are notably
retaking territory along a broad arc around Kharkiv rather than focusing on a
narrow thrust, indicating an ability to launch larger-scale offensive
operations than we have observed so far in the war.”
Reflecting increased
confidence, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for the first time outlined
strict conditions on May 6 to enter peace talks with Russia, including
a withdrawal of Russian forces to pre-February 24 borders, the return of nearly
six million refugees, membership in the European Union, and accountability for
those Russians who committed war crimes.
These remarks were a far cry
from those Zelenskyy made on April 10. “No one wants to negotiate with a person or
people who tortured this nation,” Zelenskyy said. But “we don’t want to lose
opportunities, if we have them, for a diplomatic solution”.
Elsewhere, the war seemed to
have reached an impasse; nowhere did Russia score a significant advance.
In Zaporizhzhia, in the
country’s south, locals reported a Russian unit shot up 20 of its
vehicles to avoid combat duty.
The unexpected difficulty of
seizing Ukraine has raised questions about how long Russia will commit lives
and money. Even Russian President Vladimir Putin’s only military ally, Belarus
President Alexander Lukashenko, has said, “I
feel like this operation has dragged on.”
United States Director of
National Intelligence Avril Haines told a Congressional committee that Putin
“is preparing for a prolonged conflict … moving along a more unpredictable and
potentially escalatory trajectory”.
CIA
Director William Burns said Putin “doesn’t believe he can afford to
lose” in Ukraine. “I think he’s convinced right now that doubling down still
will enable him to make progress.”
But there are limits to
Putin’s stamina, said Emmanuel Karagiannis, a reader in international security
at King’s College London.
“Since 1991, almost all
inter-state wars have lasted weeks or months. Given the intensity of Western
sanctions and the number of Russian casualties, Moscow cannot afford to
continue the war for years,” Karagiannis told Al Jazeera.
The European Commission unveiled
a sixth round of sanctions on May 4, including “a complete import ban on all
Russian oil, seaborne and pipeline, crude and refined” by the end of the year,
in President Ursula Von der Leyen’s words to European Parliament.
The US House of
Representatives is preparing to approve a
new $40bn package of military and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine.
“Western military support for
Ukraine has been a game-changing factor, which Moscow apparently did not
anticipate in its strategy. The Russian army was ill-prepared for such a long
campaign and now suffers massive losses,” Karagiannis said.
The only good news for Russia
during the week was that its forces finally began to storm the tunnels under
the Azovstal
metallurgical plant in Mariupol, where at least 1,000 Ukrainian fighters
refuse to surrender. Russia has bombed the plant from the air and ground
artillery, but had not risked the potentially high casualties of close-quarters
combat.
On May 5, Captain
Sviatoslav Palamar,
deputy commander of the Azov
regiment, told the Hromadske news service, “The Azovstal plant has been
actively stormed for three days now … fighting is underway.” He sent a message
via Telegram saying, “Give the opportunity to pick up the bodies of soldiers so
that Ukrainians can say goodbye to their heroes.”
The head of the Mariupol
patrol police, Mykhailo Vershinin, said the defenders’ perimeter was shrinking and
the wounded were piling up.
On May 8, Palamar implied
defeat may come soon. “We will continue to fight as long as we are alive to
repel the Russian occupiers,” he told an online
conference. “We don’t have much time; we are coming under intense
shelling.”
The battle for Mariupol has become
emblematic of Ukraine’s spirit. Removing the last pocket of resistance would be
a symbolic victory for Putin, as well as enabling him to claim the entire
littoral of the Sea
of Azov.
No comments:
Post a Comment