Donetsk braces for brutal war
"I hope that everything will continue in their direction as has happened in Lugansk so far."
Fighting raged in and around Ukraine's eastern Donbas region yesterday as Russian troops tried to build on recent battlefield gains, while Nato pressed ahead with Finland and Sweden's momentous membership bids.
With the war well into its fifth month, Kyiv's allies yesterday committed to supporting Ukraine through what is likely to be a lengthy and expensive recovery, agreeing on the need for broad reforms to boost transparency and tackle corruption.
The two days of talks in the Swiss city of Lugano heard that rebuilding the war-ravaged country is estimated to cost at least $750 billion.
But on the battlefield, the conflict continued to wreak devastation, with the Ukrainian president's office reporting Russian shelling and missile strikes in several regions overnight.
Russian forces set their sights on their next objectives in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk province yesterday after President Vladimir Putin claimed victory in neighbouring Luhansk province.
"Military units, including the East group and the West group, must carry out their tasks according to previously approved plans," Putin said.
"I hope that everything will continue in their direction as has happened in Lugansk so far."
The capture of the city of Lysychansk on Sunday completed the Russian conquest of Luhansk, one of two regions in Donbas, the industrialised eastern region of Ukraine that has become the site of the biggest battle in Europe in generations.
Both sides have suffered heavy casualties in the fight for Luhansk, particularly during the siege of the twin cities of Lysychansk and Severodonetsk. Both cities have been left in ruins by relentless Russian bombardment.
Ukrainian forces yesterday took up new defensive lines in Donetsk, where they still control major cities.
Russian forces shelled the towns of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk overnight, according to Pavlo Kyrylenko, the governor of Donetsk.
"They are now also the main line of assault for the enemy," he said of the towns. "There is no safe place without shelling in Donetsk region."
Since the outset of the conflict, Russia has demanded that Ukraine hand both Luhansk and Donetsk to pro-Moscow separatists, which have declared independent statelets.
In Moscow, the defence ministry reported that Russian forces had targeted the city of Kharkiv with "high-precision" weapons over the past 24 hours, killing up to 150 Ukrainian servicemen.
"This is the last victory for Russia on Ukrainian territory," Oleksiy Arestovych, adviser to President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said in a video posted online.
"These were medium-sized cities. And this took from 4th April until 4th July -- that's 90 days. So many losses."
Arestovych said besides the battle for Donetsk, Ukraine was hoping to launch counter offensives in the south of the country.
"Taking the cities in the east meant that 60 percent of Russian forces are now concentrated in the east and it is difficult for them to be redirected to the south," he said.
"And there are no more forces that can be brought in from Russia. They paid a big price for Severodonetsk and Lysychansk."
Some military experts reckoned the hard fought victory had brought Russian forces little strategic gain, and the outcome of what has been dubbed the "battle of the Donbas" remained in the balance.
To the southwest, in the Moscow-occupied Kherson region, Russia's troops were deploying helicopters and various artillery to try to stem Ukrainian counter-attacks.
"Ukrainian aviation and missile and artillery units continue to strike enemy depots and invaders' concentrations, in particular in the Kherson region," Ukraine's armed forces said.
Meanwhile, Nato's 30 allies signed an accession protocol for Finland and Sweden yesterday to allow them to join the nuclear-armed alliance once allied parliaments ratify the decision, the most significant expansion of the alliance since the mid-1990s.
"This is truly an historic moment," Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said alongside the foreign ministers of the two countries. "With 32 nations around the table, we will be even stronger."
The protocol means Helsinki and Stockholm can participate in Nato meetings and have greater access to intelligence but will not be protected by the Nato defence clause that an attack on one ally is an attack against all until ratification. That is likely to take up to a year.
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