Ukraine declares 'tactical victory', rejects peace talks

Focus of the fight

Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar said on June 17 that the country's military is "actively" stepping up its counteroffensive campaign in the south. "In fact, in all areas, in all directions where our units are attacking in the south, they are achieving tactical victories. They are advancing step by step. We have now advanced by 2 km in each direction," she wrote on her Telegram channel. On the eastern front, Ms. Maliar said Russian forces are trying to dislodge Ukrainian forces from established positions.

Earlier, Ms. Maliar revealed that the focus of the battlefield was shifting south. She said that the fiercest fighting was no longer taking place around the city of Bakhmut (in Donetsk province) but in areas closer to the Black Sea, especially in the direction of the two coastal cities of Berdyansk (in Zaporizhzhia province) and Mariupol (in Donetsk province), according to The Guardian.

Ukraine tuyên bố 'thắng lợi chiến thuật', từ chối hòa đàm - Ảnh 1. — President Zelensky (third from right) and African leaders in Kyiv on June 16.

In an intelligence update on Twitter the same day, the British Ministry of Defense said that Russia had reinforced its attack helicopter force in southern Ukraine since Kyiv began its counter-offensive. Images obtained by the British military showed that Russia had deployed 20 more helicopters to Berdyansk airport. British defense intelligence also said that Russia was gaining a temporary advantage in southern Ukraine, especially with attack helicopters using long-range missiles against ground targets.

Russia has yet to officially acknowledge any progress by Ukraine in the counter-offensive. RIA news agency reported on June 17 that Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu visited a tank factory in Russia's Omsk region to inspect the implementation of defense orders. There, he asked the factory to increase its production capacity of tanks and heavy flamethrower systems to meet the needs of the Russian army participating in a "special military operation" in Ukraine.

In another development related to the situation in southern Ukraine, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on June 16 that it was still unclear whether water from the reservoir could continue to be pumped to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant for cooling, after the Kakhovka hydroelectric dam collapsed. This is Europe's largest nuclear power plant with 6 reactors.

Prospects for peace talks

Amid Ukraine’s counter-offensive, a delegation of five African leaders traveled to Ukraine and Russia to seek a negotiated end to the conflict. However, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky appeared unenthusiastic about their proposals, ruling out peace talks for now.

In Kyiv on June 16, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa presented a plan that would see both Russia and Ukraine de-escalate the fighting, conduct a prisoner exchange, return children abducted from Ukraine, and export grain and fertilizer freely to world markets. But at the end of their joint press conference, Mr. Zelensky said he did not understand the “roadmap” proposed by African leaders, according to Reuters. At the same time, the Ukrainian president reiterated his stance that Kyiv would only sit down at the negotiating table after Moscow withdrew all its troops from Ukraine.

Ramaphosa, along with the leaders of Senegal, Egypt, Zambia and Comoros, will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Russian city of St. Petersburg on June 17. In an interview with TASS ahead of the meeting, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that the conflict resolution initiatives proposed by various countries contain some viable ideas.

What did President Putin say about nuclear weapons in Belarus?

Speaking at an economic forum in St. Petersburg (Russia) on June 16, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Moscow's tactical nuclear warheads had been transferred to close ally Belarus. According to the leader, this is a reminder that the West cannot cause Moscow a strategic defeat, but Russia does not need to use nuclear weapons at this time, according to RIA.

The White House condemned Mr Putin's remarks, but said the US had made no changes to its nuclear posture in response to these words, according to Reuters.

Source link