Ukraine, struggling on land, deals a blow to Russia at sea

As outgunned Ukrainian soldiers struggle to hold off bloody Russian attacks on the country, Ukraine said Wednesday its forces had dealt another powerful blow to the Russians at sea, with a large Russian landing ship off the coast of the country before dawn. Crimea had been sunk.

The Ukrainian military released images of the attack, which it said resulted in the sinking of the 110-metre landing ship Caesar Kunikov, the fourth largest landing ship to be put out of action during the war, hampering its logistics efforts. possibly made Russia more difficult in the south. Ukraine.

The Ukrainian claims could not immediately be confirmed, but when NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was asked about the attack, he called Ukraine's Black Sea campaign a “great achievement.”

“The Ukrainians have managed to inflict heavy losses on the Russian Black Sea Fleet,” he said at a news conference in Brussels. According to Ukrainian officials and military analysts, Russia has lost more than a third of its fleet since the war began.

Russia declined to comment on the attack.

At the same time, however, Ukrainian ground forces find themselves in perhaps their most precarious position since the first months of the Russian invasion.

“The enemy is now advancing along almost the entire front line and we have switched from offensive operations to conducting a defensive operation,” Ukraine's top military commander, General Oleksandr Syrsky, told German broadcaster ZDF in his first interview since taking office . promoted to the post last week.

The epicenter of the current fighting is around the battered city of Avdiivka, an old Ukrainian stronghold in eastern Ukraine. Russian forces have broken through Ukrainian defenses to enter the city in multiple locations, threatening to cut off the main supply line for Ukrainian defenders.

Kiev has sent reinforcements, but soldiers fighting there say it is unclear how long they can hold out. A growing ammunition shortage has forced local commanders to ration their fire, making it harder to push back the Russian advance.