Ukraine\u2019s future depends on the outcome of the battle raging around Bakhmut and other key cities and towns in the east of the country, Ukraine\u2019s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.
\nZelenskyy said in a video address late on Monday that Ukraine\u2019s future relied on destroying Russian forces attacking Bakhmut and other war-torn areas in the country\u2019s eastern Donetsk region.
\n\u201cIt is very tough in the east, very painful. We need to destroy the enemy\u2019s military might, and we will,\u201d Zelenskyy said.
\n\u201cBilohorivka and Marinka, Avdiivka and Bakhmut, Vuhledar and Kamyanka,\u201d Zelenskyy said, naming the key battlegrounds, adding, \u201cand all other places where our future is being decided. Where our future, the future of all Ukrainians, is being fought for.\u201d
\nRussia has said that capturing Bakhmut opens a path to taking control of the entire Donetsk region, a central war aim for Moscow.
\nAfter weeks of grinding and bloody battles, the Ukrainian military says it has not retreated from Bakhmut and is intent on staying to fight in order to inflict severe losses on the Russian assault force, which is said to have thrown a huge number of soldiers into the fight without regards for casualties.
\nRussian forces led by the Wagner mercenary army have captured Bakhmut\u2019s east but have so far failed to encircle the city despite making announcements over recent weeks that a Ukrainian defeat was imminent.
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