Wagner’s mercenaries retreat, leaving Bakhmut to Russian troops

Russian mercenaries from Wagner’s group began retreating from the eastern city this Thursday Bakhmutafter announcing his capture last Saturday, a retreat that began in the suburbs of the destroyed city, and this was confirmed by the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.

“We withdrew the Bakhmut units. By June 1, most of them will be placed in rear camps,” the mercenary chief said on Thursday. Yevgeny Prigozhinin a video allegedly shot among the ruins of the city.

The leader of the Russian fighters added that his units, after completing their mission, hand over assistance in Bakhmut to regular Russian troops. “We left the positions to the army, we left everything to the army: positions, ammunition, and even food rations,” said the businessman.

Prigozhin did not miss the opportunity to lash out at the Russian military leadership, whom he had attacked and even insulted in recent months, saying he was leaving two of his men in case the army needed help defending Bakhmut.

For the capture of the city, which took nine and a half months, the mercenaries paid a high price: 16,000 dead, of which 10,000 were convicts recruited from Russian prisons, Putin’s chef admitted in an interview published on Wednesday.

Kyiv confirms the relief

The Ukrainian authorities, for their part, confirmed the beginning of the discovery of the Wagner family by the Russian army. “In the suburbs of Bakhmut, the enemy replaced Wagner’s troops with units of the regular armyUkrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar said Thursday, insisting that Ukrainian forces “control the outskirts of the city in the southwestern part of Litak district.”

If they repeated the replacement of mercenaries in Kiev, the Russian Ministry of Defense did not mention this fact in its daily war section, in which it limited itself to reporting on a series of actions in different sectors of the front.

Coinciding with the beginning of the withdrawal of Wagner’s fighters, Ukrainian authorities announced the release of 106 Ukrainian soldiers who had been captured in Bakhmut in an exchange operation. “Among those returning from captivity, there are also those who were reported as missing,” said Andriy Yermak, the head of the Ukrainian president’s office.

Officially, the Russian side did not confirm the exchange, about which a video taken by a drone was published on social networks showing the exchange of prisoners on the road where there are several armored vehicles of both sides with large flags. White.

Several analysts believe that Ukrainian counterattacks in recent weeks, which have already enabled Kyiv troops to recapture territory on the northern and southern flanks of Bakhmut and part of the southwestern part of the city they were part of the announced Ukrainian counter-offensive.

Attacks on Russian logistics

An adviser to the Ukrainian presidential office, Mikhailo Podolyak, said on Thursday that this type of operation does not begin with a concrete action and explained that, for example, the latest attacks on Russian logistics are part of that campaign.

“It is not a ‘one-time event’ that begins at a certain time on a certain day with the act of cutting the ribbon,” Podolyak tweeted amid repeated speculation about when Ukraine would launch its next operation to recapture territory occupied by Russia.

An adviser to the Ukrainian president explained that “dozens of actions to destroy Russian occupation forces in various areas” have already taken place, which will continue in the future and should be seen as part of Ukraine’s efforts to expel Russian troops.

Russia formalizes delivery of tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus

rm manueco / colpisa

Moscow and Minsk formalized the deployment of Russian tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus on Thursday with the signing of a corresponding agreement by the defense ministers of both countries, Sergei Shoigu and Viktor Khrenin. The ceremony was held in the Belarusian capital, after which a press release was published announcing that “the signed documents define the procedure for maintaining tactical nuclear weapons in a special storage facility on the territory of the Republic of Belarus.”

He assured Shoigu that Moscow would maintain control over these weapons and reiterated that turning Belarus into a nuclear country “is in line with legal obligations at the international level.” This measure was announced by Russian President Vladimir Putin on March 25, just two months ago, as his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko requested it, according to him, as compensation for the alleged delivery of the same type of weapons by the United States. to its European allies.

Putin also said at the time that Russia “helped Belarus re-equip ten Belarusian bombers to carry tactical nuclear weapons and transferred the Iskander missile system to the Army in Minsk,” also capable of carrying atomic payloads. The Russian leader further stated that as of July 1, Russia “plans to complete the construction of a special storage facility for tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus.” According to the head of the Kremlin, the reason for such decisions “was the statement of the British Ministry of Defense that it will supply Ukraine with shells with depleted uranium”.