Russia vows to capture Bakhmut, push further into Ukraine

Russia has appeared intent to capture it at all costs.

KYIV (AFP) - The Russian army vowed on Tuesday (Mar 7) to capture the eastern Ukrainian town of Bakhmut, a move that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said would give Moscow an "open road" for offensives deeper into his country.

The intense fighting in the east raged on as United Nations chief Antonio Guterres headed to Kyiv for talks. 

The battle for Bakhmut - a salt-mining town with a pre-war population of 80,000 - has been the longest and bloodiest in Russia's more than year-long invasion that has devastated swathes of Ukraine and displaced millions.

Russia has appeared intent to capture it at all costs.

"Capturing (Bakhmut) will allow for further offensive operations deep into the defence lines of the Armed Forces of Ukraine," Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu told military officials during a televised meeting on Tuesday.

In Kyiv, Zelenskyy said that the army was intent on defending Bakhmut despite a rumoured retreat under pressure from Russian forces, who have sought to capture the city for months.

Zelenskyy said that Russia would have an "open road" into eastern Ukraine if it captures the besieged city of Bakhmut, CNN reported on Tuesday.

"We understand that after Bakhmut they could go further. They could go to Kramatorsk, they could go to Sloviansk, it would be open road for the Russians after Bakhmut to other towns in Ukraine, in the Donetsk direction," Zelenskyy told CNN's Wolf Blitzer in an interview due to air in the United States on Wednesday.

Russia's mercenary group Wagner has spearheaded the attack on Bakhmut, and its head Yevgeny Prigozhin, who is locked in a rift with Russia's military leadership, appeared to mock Shoigu saying he had "not seen him" near the battlefield.

TANKS FROM POLAND

Prigozhin estimated that between "12,000 and 20,000" Ukrainian troops were still defending the city.

He said that while "very tough battles are ongoing both day and night", Ukraine's fighters "are not running away".

Ukraine got a boost on Tuesday, however, when its western neighbour and fervent ally Poland announced the sending of 10 Leopard tanks this week.

Both sides have said that the Bakhmut battle has cost a significant number of troops, but neither gave figures.

Outside the town, a Ukrainian soldier told AFP that Kyiv was losing control.

"Bakhmut will fall," one exhausted soldier said on Monday in the town of Chasiv Yar, 10km west of the frontline.

Some units had started to retreat in "small groups", he said.

Ukrainian officials say that around 4,000 civilians remain in the town, which has been virtually flattened.

"Approximately 38 children, as far as we know, remain in Bakhmut," Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk told regional media on Tuesday.

BELARUS DETAINS SABOTAGE GROUP Amid fears of Moscow-allied Belarus, Ukraine's northern neighbour, entering the conflict, Minsk accused Ukrainian secret services on Tuesday of being behind a partisan plot to damage a Russian plane in the country last month.

Long-time leader Alexander Lukashenko said that 20 people had been detained in connection with attacking the plane. Regime opponents said partisans damaged the jet at an airstrip near the capital Minsk last month.

Lukashenko identified the main culprit as a joint Russian and Ukrainian citizen and lashed out against Zelenskyy.

Lukashenko, who allowed his Russian ally Vladimir Putin to use Belarusian territory as a launchpad for his Ukraine invasion a year ago, said that the alleged culprit was a "terrorist".

KILLING VIDEO GOES VIRAL

Ukraine also said on Tuesday that it had identified a soldier filmed being shot dead in a video widely shared on social media that sparked outrage.

The footage shows what appears to be a detained Ukrainian combatant standing in a shallow trench, smoking and being shot after saying "glory to Ukraine".

The phrase spoken by the alleged Ukrainian soldier has trended on social media. Senior officials in Kyiv blamed Russian forces and called for justice.

The Ukrainian army identified him as Tymofiy Shadura, a servicemen of the 30th Separate Mechanised Brigade.

He had been missing since Feb 3 amid fighting near Bakhmut and his identity would be confirmed when his remains were returned, the military added.

AFP could not independently verify where or when the footage was filmed or whether it showed - as Ukrainian officials and social media users suggested - a Ukrainian prisoner of war.

On Monday, Zelenskyy said that the video showed Russian forces "brutally killing" a Ukrainian serviceman. "We will find the murderers," he vowed.

Guterres, the UN secretary-general, was travelling to Ukraine to meet Zelenskyy in his third trip since Russia's invasion, a UN spokesman said.