President Volodymyr Zelenskiy postponed all his foreign trips as the battlefield situation continued to deteriorate on Wednesday and Kyiv said fighting raged in the northeastern border town of Vovchansk in Kharkiv region.
The capture of the town 5 kilometres (3 miles) from the border would be Russia’s most significant gain since it launched an incursion into the Kharkiv region on Friday, opening a new front and forcing Kyiv to rush in reinforcements.
The assault keeps Ukraine’s stretched and depleted forces off balance ahead of what Zelenskiy has said could be a big Russian offensive in the coming weeks. Moscow has been slowly making ground in the east for months.
“The situation is extremely difficult. The enemy is taking positions on the streets of the town of Vovchansk,” Oleksiy Kharkivskiy, Vovchansk’s patrol police chief, said on Facebook. Dmytro Lazutkin, a spokesman for the defence ministry, said “some” Russian infantry groups had entered the town, which military analysts reckon Moscow needs to capture to continue its offensive thrust deeper into the region.
Ukrainian troops later managed to “partially” push the Russian forces back from the town, the general staff said, but “defensive actions” continued in the north and northwestern outskirts.
Kyiv’s forces were trying to prevent Russia from building up troops and military hardware in Vovchansk’s north, the military added. Russia’s defence ministry said on Wednesday its forces captured two more settlements in the region – Hlyboke and Lukyantsi, both about 25 kilometres from Kharkiv’s outskirts.
