Ukraine has captured its
first village in Luhansk as its counter-offensive presses further into
Russia-occupied territory, refusing to slow after snatching back thousands of
miles in east Ukraine from the Russian war machine.
The occupied country said its
troops have marched farther east into territory recently abandoned by Russia
after its six-month campaign, paving the way for a potential assault on
Moscow’s occupation forces in the Donbas region as Kyiv seeks more
Western arms.
The village lies only a dozen
or so miles from the towns of Lysychansk and Severdonestsk, regions that took
Russia five months to conquer — with the Ukrainian army stating its intent
to take back all of Luhansk, much of which has been occupied since 2014.
In a sign of nervousness from
a Moscow-backed administration in Donbas about the success of Ukraine’s recent
offensive, its leader called for urgent referendums on the region becoming part
of Russia.
‘The occupiers are clearly in
a panic,’ Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a televised address
late on Monday, adding that he was now focused on ‘speed’ in liberated areas.
‘The speed at which our troops
are moving. The speed in restoring normal life,’ Zelensky said.
Further boosting the war
effort, Liz Truss is set to tell the UN in New York she will spend billions
more arming Ukrainians in 2023 during her first overseas trip as UK Prime
Minister.
World leaders this week will
hear from Truss that the UK intends to match or exceed the £2.3billion pound it
committed to Ukraine’s war effort against Russia in 2022, the Financial Times
reported on Tuesday.
