Ukraine withdraws from devastated town of Avdiivka, handing Russia key victory
Ukrainian troops on Saturday withdrew from the devastated eastern town of Avdiivka after a year-long battle, Kyiv’s new military chief said, all but handing a victory and key position to Russia.
The decision was made to save Kyiv’s troops fighting in the bombed-out town from being encircled by Russians, according to Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskyi, who took his post last week following a major reshuffling in military leadership.
“I decided to withdraw our units from the town and move to defense from more favorable lines in order to avoid encirclement and preserve the lives and health of servicemen,” Syrskyi said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday backed his new military leader’s decision to withdraw and praised the troops for “exhausting” Russian troops in the front-line town.
Russia made several attempts to capture the city since October, eventually surrounding it on three sides and limiting the resupply routes for Ukrainian forces, according to AFP.
The year-long battle for the front-line city, which lies less than six miles north of Russian-controlled Donetsk, has been among the war’s bloodiest.
The fighting drew comparisons to the “meat grinder” battle for Bakhmut, where tens of thousands died before Russia captured the town.
Before Russia’s invasion, Avdiivka was an industrial hub home to roughly 34,000 people.
Now, roughly 1,000 remain in a town largely destroyed and reduced to rubble.
With the Ukraine-Russian war entering its third year this coming week, the withdrawal is a stark sign that the fighting is now shifted in Moscow’s favor, following a dismal counteroffensive last year that failed to advance Ukraine’s front-line positions.
The withdrawal from Avdiivka comes as Ukraine is facing a dire ammunition shortage due to a US military aid package being held up for months in Congress.
At the Munich Security Conference Saturday, Zelensky called on Western allies to bolster their military aid supplies, suggesting that his troops had to withdraw partly due to the lack of weapons.
“Now, [the military] will replenish, they will wait for the relevant weapons, of which there simply weren’t enough, simply aren’t enough,” he said.
“Russia has long-range weapons, while we simply don’t have enough.”
Zelensky also invited former President Donald Trump, who this week said he would “encourage” Russia to attack NATO allies, to visit the frontline in Ukraine so he could experience “real war,” Bloomberg reported.
While the withdrawal was conducted as leaders planned, some Ukrainian forces were captured during the fallback, Brigadier-General Oleksandr Tarnavskyi said but did not specify the numbers.
“At the final stage of the operation, under the pressure of the overwhelming enemy forces, a certain number of Ukrainian servicemen were captured,” Tarnavskyi wrote on Telegram.
With Post wires
