On the front: “the Russians come, come back and come back again”
The sounds of explosions are incessant, the exchanges of artillery almost uninterrupted: near Vougledar, the situation is “very tense” for the Ukrainian army. For several days, the Russian army has indeed created a second focus of fighting, 130 kilometers south-west of Bakhmout.
“The more time passes, the more the situation gets worse,” comments to AFP Oleksandre, 45, a Ukrainian soldier who fires mortars from his post installed just 5 kilometers from Vougledar. The Russians “come, come back and come back again,” he told AFP. “Every day, we have more and more work,” he says alongside his war companions. For several days, the fire has been falling everywhere. On the ground, no snow but a winter cold and icy rain falling intermittently. “If we can, we sleep. Otherwise, no. It’s our job,” explains Oleksandre, who swears he wants to do everything to “not give” the city to the Russians.
Beside him, Roman, the 35-year-old commander of this unit, describes the Russian tactics: “They are trying to break through our defenses in all directions where we stand”. His team is installed at the edge of a small wood, enough to hide and not be spotted by the reconnaissance drones of the Russian army, positioned about 5 kilometers away. He deplores the numerical advantage of the Russians, whose army has been reinforced in recent months by several hundred reservists. “They have equipment, they have weapons and they have more people than us,” he swears.
Not far from the front line, other Ukrainian soldiers are busy cutting wood to consolidate the trenches dug in the ground hardened by the cold and warm the troops.
In the nearby village of Bogoyavlenka, one of the few civilians still present in the area, Andriï Sajnev, 43, explains that the last delivery of humanitarian aid dates back to two weeks ago. Since then, faced with the intensification of the strikes and the lack of electricity and drinking water, more than half of the 300 remaining inhabitants have left, according to him.
