Ukraine reports attacks on the city center of Sievjerodonetsk Moscow reports the capture of the strategically important small town of Lyman Zelenskyj describes the difficult situation in the Donbass The developments in the Ukraine war in the stern ticker.
Day 95 of the Russian invasion of Ukraine: Ukraine has again urged the West to continue supplying heavy weapons. Advisers to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy specifically named multiple rocket launchers and anti-ship missiles. This would also break through the blockade of Ukrainian ports, it said. Meanwhile, the situation in the embattled city of Severodonetsk continues to deteriorate.
6:28 p.m.: Ukraine reports attacks on the city center of Sieverodonetsk
According to Ukrainian sources, fighting in the Donbass continues with undiminished intensity, especially in the Sieverodonetsk area. The enemy “attempts to gain a foothold on the north-eastern outskirts of Sevierodonetsk and is conducting offensive operations towards the city center,” the Ukrainian General Staff said in its situation report. The ground offensive is supported by artillery and air force.
The former city of Sievjerodonetsk has been the target of Russian attack efforts for months. It is the last point that the Ukrainian military still keeps under control in the Luhansk region.
In addition to the city itself, active battles would also be fought over the nearby towns of Bakhmut and Kurachowe. “The enemy’s main goal is to surround our troops in the Lysychansk and Sievjerodonetsk oblasts and to block the most important logistics routes,” the situation report said. In addition, Russian troops continued to prepare the crossing of the Seversky Donets River. Accordingly, the troops in the region would be ammunition and refueled.
Further west in the direction of Sloviansk, Russian storm attempts have been fended off according to Ukrainian reports. In the south of the country, on the border between the Cherson and Mykolaiv regions, where Kiev troops had gone on the offensive the day before, the Russian armed forces are now trying to recapture the villages that had been lost in the process. The information could not be verified independently.
4:36 p.m .: Ukrainian President Zelenskyj visits Kharkiv front area
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has visited the embattled Kharkiv region in the east of the country. Video footage shared on Sunday on the president’s official Telegram channel showed Zelenskyy awarding soldiers, inspecting the destroyed infrastructure in Kharkiv, but also inspecting burnt-out military vehicles abandoned by the Russian army. It is Zelenskyy’s first known visit to the frontline in the east of the country since the beginning of the war.
Selenskyj thanked the soldiers for their commitment. “I am immensely proud of our defenders. Every day they risk their lives to fight for the freedom of Ukraine,” said the President.
While Zelenskyi received a report from the military leadership on the operational situation at the front, he spoke to Governor Oleh Synehubov about the damage to civilian objects in the region. According to Synehubov, more than 2,000 houses were destroyed in Kharkiv and the surrounding area. 31 percent of the territory is still under Russian control. The Ukrainian counter-offensive in April and May contributed to the liberation of five percent of the area, Synehubov said.
11.46 a.m .: Russian ambassador does not expect nuclear weapons to be used
The Russian ambassador in London, Andrei Kelin, does not expect his country to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine. According to the rules of the Russian military, this is only provided if Russia’s existence is threatened, Kelin said in a BBC interview broadcast on Sunday. “This has nothing to do with the current operation.” When asked whether he believed President Vladimir Putin would be prepared to launch a nuclear attack on Britain if the war escalated, the ambassador said no. This and similar scenarios were publicly discussed on Russian state television a few weeks ago.
10:48 a.m .: London accuses Russia of deliberately spreading misleading narratives
London accuses Russia of deliberately spreading misleading narratives in the Ukraine war. Moscow is ready “to jeopardize global food security for its own political goals and then present itself as a reasonable actor and blame the West for any failure,” the British Defense Ministry said in an update on Sunday, citing intelligence information .
A few days ago, Russia asked Ukraine to clear the port of Odessa so that ships could pass through safely. In fact, Moscow itself blocks the export of grain from Ukrainian ports. According to the British, this is a core idea of modern Russian communications strategy. This is how “alternative narratives” are introduced, often unconvincingly, to make it difficult for the public to understand the situation.
Since the beginning of the war, the British government has regularly published intelligence information on the course of the war of aggression in an unusually open manner. Moscow accuses London of a targeted disinformation campaign.
7.25 a.m .: Military expert Masala believes: “It’s working” for Putin
According to political scientist and military expert Carlo Masala, Russian President Vladimir Putin currently sees no reason for negotiations with Ukraine. Masala, Professor of International Politics at the University of the Bundeswehr in Munich, told the German Press Agency that Putin would only begin to negotiate seriously if he had to fear that he would lose more than he would win by continuing the war. But that is not the case at the moment. “It’s going well for him. So there’s no incentive at all to get involved in these negotiations.”
According to Masala, the most recent military successes of the Russian armed forces in the Donbass in eastern Ukraine can be traced back to two causes: First, the Ukrainians lack heavy weapons. Second, the Russians had successfully changed their strategy. “In contrast to the course of the war so far, they are no longer advancing on broad sections of the front, but are assembling their troops in order to advance on small parts of the front. This means that they currently have a personnel advantage.”
6.48 a.m .: The situation in the embattled city of Severodonetsk is coming to a head
In the eastern Ukrainian Donbass, the situation for the residents of the embattled city of Severodonetsk is becoming increasingly hopeless, according to the authorities. “Russia is using all means to conquer Severodonetsk or to prevent communication in the region and in Ukraine,” said the governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Gaiday, on the Telegram messenger service on Saturday evening. “The coming week will be very difficult,” he added. However, the Russian troops are not able to implement all their plans in the near future.
The mayor of Severodonetsk, Olexander Stryuk, also referred to Telegram on the “many means” used by the Russian army to take the city. “But they can’t do that yet,” he said with conviction. “We believe the city will hold up.” He expressed concern about the sanitary situation in the city, which had a population of 100,000 before the war.
5 a.m.: Zelenskyj calls for Russia to be classified as a terrorist state
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia of a policy of terror. “I will always remind the world that Russia must finally be officially recognized as a terrorist state, as a sponsor of terrorism,” Zelenskyy said in a video address. At the beginning of the week he wanted to address the participants of the EU special summit in Brussels and also talk about it.
“About terrorism, which today has actually become the only form of action by the Russian state against Europe,” said the President. “Terror on the territory of Ukraine. Terror on the energy market in Europe, not only in our country. Terror on the food market, worldwide. And what terror will come next?” Only together could the Europeans stop the politics of such a state, he stressed.
The news of Saturday May 28, 2022.
10:10 p.m.: Ukraine requests long-range multiple rocket launchers
Ukraine has asked the West to supply advanced long-range multiple rocket launchers to fight against Russia. “If the West really wants Ukraine to win, maybe it’s time to give us MLRS?” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s adviser Mykhailo Podoliak said on Twitter. MLRS are US-made artillery systems. “It’s hard to fight when you’re attacked from a distance of 70 kilometers and you don’t have anything to defend yourself with,” Podoljak said. Ukraine could bring Russia back “behind the Iron Curtain”. “But for that we need effective weapons. Here and now.
3:03 p.m .: Putin warns Germany and France against further arms deliveries to Ukraine
Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned Germany and France against further arms deliveries to Ukraine. In a telephone conversation with Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) and President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday, the Kremlin boss said, according to Russian information, that further arms deliveries were “dangerous”. As a result, there is a risk that “the situation in Ukraine will continue to destabilize and the humanitarian crisis will worsen.”
According to the federal government, the telephone call lasted 80 minutes and was made by Scholz and Macron. The Chancellor and the French President had urged “an immediate armistice and a withdrawal of Russian troops”.
According to government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit, they also called on the Russian president to conduct “serious direct negotiations” with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and find a diplomatic solution to the conflict.
2:56 p.m .: Putin – Help with grain export possible if sanctions are relaxed
In a telephone conversation with Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), Russia’s head of state Vladimir Putin promised to allow grain exports from Ukraine if Western sanctions against his country were relaxed. Russia is “ready” to find opportunities “for grain exports without obstacles,” Putin said in a phone call with Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday, according to the Kremlin. However, Western sanctions against Russia would also have to be lifted.
11:25 a.m .: Moscow reports another “successful” test of hypersonic missile
In the midst of its intensified military offensive in Ukraine, Russia says it has tested a hypersonic missile again. The Zirkon-type missile was fired from a frigate in the Barents Sea towards a target in the White Sea in the Arctic, the Defense Ministry said in Moscow. The target at a distance of around a thousand kilometers “was sighted with success”. Russia first tested a Zircon missile in October 2020, and several more attempts have followed since. In March, Moscow announced that it had deployed Kinzhal-type hypersonic missiles in western Ukraine.
11:09 a.m .: Moscow reports the capture of the strategically important small town of Lyman
The Russian military has claimed complete control of the strategically important small town of Lyman in eastern Ukraine’s Donbass region. “Due to the joint action of units of the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Russian armed forces, the city of Krasny Liman was completely liberated from Ukrainian nationalists,” said Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov. Krasny Liman is the name for Lyman that dates back to Soviet times.
The separatists allied with Moscow had already announced the conquest on Friday. On Saturday, the Ukrainian general staff also indirectly admitted the case of the small town. Lyman is strategically important as a railway junction and road link to the metropolitan areas of Sieverodonetsk – Lysychansk in the east and Sloviansk – Kramatorsk in the south-west.
10.46 a.m .: Habeck rejects allegations of arms deliveries to Ukraine
Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) has rejected the accusation that Germany is too reluctant to deliver arms to Ukraine. “As we speak, Ukrainian soldiers are being trained on the Panzerhaubitze 2000,” Habeck told Welt am Sonntag, referring to the planned delivery of the mobile artillery pieces. It is by no means the case that Germany delivers nothing or too little. It is true that Berlin cannot fulfill all of Ukraine’s wishes.
Germany wants to deliver seven examples of the Panzerhaubitze 2000 to the Ukraine in June. Since mid-May, dozens of Ukrainian soldiers have been trained on the gun mounted on a tank chassis at the Bundeswehr artillery school in Idar-Oberstein, Rhineland-Palatinate.
10:09 a.m .: Kherson closes border with Ukrainian-controlled area
The Cherson region in southern Ukraine, occupied by Russian troops, has closed the border to the north to refugees. “The border crossing in the direction of the Mykolayiv and Dnipropetrovsk regions is very dangerous given the systematic shelling by Ukrainian fighters,” said the deputy head of the pro-Russian military administration, Kirill Stremoussov, explaining the decision. Leaving the Cherson region is instead possible via the Crimean peninsula or the Russian-controlled part of the Zaporizhia region.
The new administration has taken numerous initiatives to cut off the Kherson region from Ukraine and connect it to Russia. The Russian national currency, the ruble, was introduced, the administration has demanded the issuance of Russian passports and the entry of the region into the Russian Federation – even without a prior referendum. Even Moscow reacted cautiously to the last initiative. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the people of the region must decide their own fate. The closure of the borders could serve to stop the flow of refugees into Ukrainian-occupied areas.
10:02 a.m.: Russian troops could focus on the small town of Lyman as a hub
According to estimates by British intelligence services, the Russian forces in Ukraine are likely to concentrate on the small town of Lyman as a hub in the coming days. The city in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk is said to be largely under Russian control as of Friday, according to an update from the British Ministry of Defense on Saturday.
With a major railway junction and access to major road and rail bridges across the Seversky Donets River, Lyman is of great strategic importance, including for Russia’s continued advance in Donbass. If Moscow succeeds in taking control of the city and the region around the city of Sievjerodonetsk, the Kremlin will sell this to its citizens as an important political success, the British write.
Since the beginning of the war, the British government has regularly published intelligence information on the course of the war of aggression in an unusually open manner. Moscow accuses London of a targeted disinformation campaign.
9.20 a.m .: Europol on arms deliveries: prevent situation like in the Balkan war
Europol is concerned that arms shipped from the European Union to Ukraine could end up in the wrong hands in the long term. “At some point the war will be over. We want to prevent a situation like 30 years ago in the Balkan wars. The weapons from this war are still used by criminal groups today,” said the director of the European police authority, Catherine De Bolle, in an interview with “Welt am Sunday”. Europol is therefore planning to put together an international working group to develop strategies for dealing with the situation in view of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine.
5.30 a.m .: The Ukrainian Orthodox Church breaks away from the Moscow Patriarchate
Because of the Russian war of aggression, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate declared its “complete autonomy and independence” from Moscow. The church in Kyiv said it disagreed with the position of Moscow Patriarch Kirill. Condemn the war and appeal to Ukraine and Russia to continue the negotiation process.
Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, stands firmly behind Russian President Vladimir Putin. Most recently, the pressure within the Church in Ukraine to break away from Moscow had increased. Priests had even called for a church tribunal against Kirill. In terms of number of congregations, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate is the largest of the three authoritative churches in Ukraine.
4.10 a.m.: Honorary award for Ukrainian mine detector dog at the Cannes Film Festival
An honorary award was presented to a Ukrainian mine detection dog at the Cannes Film Festival. The winner of the “Palm Dog Award” race on Friday was poodle Brit, who starred in Riley Keough and Gina Gammell’s film “War Pony” under the name Beast. The dog received a red leather collar as a trophy.
12:53 a.m.: Reports of dead and injured in Russian attacks
Ukraine has blamed Russia for the deaths of five civilians in the government-held part of the Donetsk region in the east of the country. “Today Russians killed five citizens of Donbass and wounded four others,” wrote the governor of the region, Pavlo Kirilenko, on the Telegram news channel. The Ukrainian army also spoke of heavy artillery, tank, mortar and air attacks on civilian infrastructure and peaceful residential areas. “The occupiers fired on 49 locations in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions,” it said.
12:34 a.m .: “Moscow uses a maximum of artillery and reserves”: Zelenskyj calls the situation in the Donbass very difficult
Zelenskyj described the situation in the Donbass as very difficult in view of the Russian attacks. Moscow is using a maximum of artillery and reserves there, Zelenskyj said in a video speech. The Ukrainian army is defending the country with all currently available resources. “We are doing everything to strengthen the army,” assured the President. As far as the currently fiercely contested locations in the Donbass are concerned, Zelenskyj was combative. “If the occupiers think that Lyman and Sieverodonetsk will be theirs, they are mistaken. Donbass will be Ukrainian.” If Russia brings destruction and suffering, Ukraine will restore every place. Only the Ukrainian flag will fly there and no other, stressed Zelenskyy.
