Moscow Denies Ukraine’s Claims Of Frontline Advances, Says It Has Repelled Attacks – Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

Ukraine and Russia issued conflicting accounts of the situation on the front lines in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk, where monthslong intense fighting for control of the city of Bakhmut continues, with Kyiv claiming advances while Moscow says its troops are holding the line.

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Amid Kyiv's preparations for a long-anticipated counteroffensive, Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar said on Telegram on May 12 that Ukrainian forces had advanced 2 kilometers in the Bakhmut area without ceding any ground elsewhere to the Russians.

In turn, Russia's Defense Ministry said its troops had fought off several Ukrainian attempts to overrun their positions while pounding the Bakhmut-Avdiyivka-Maryinka front line that has seen the fiercest fighting over the past several months.

Neither side's claims could be independently verified.

On May 11, Russia denied reports of Ukrainian advances in several areas near Bakhmut, although such reports came from pro-Moscow military bloggers and from Kremlin-connected Yevgeny Prigozhin, the chief of the Wagner mercenary group that has been deeply involved in the fight for the city.

Prigozhin went as far as to claim on May 11 that Ukraine's counteroffensive was already under way, though President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said more time is needed to prepare for any such move.

Nonetheless, Ukraine's preparations for a counteroffensive received an important boost on May 11 when Britain announced it was supplying long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine, giving Kyiv the capability to hit Russian troops well behind the front lines. Storm Shadow missiles have a range of more than 250 kilometers.

But Kyiv has remained tight-lipped about its plans, with Zelenskiy saying his forces still lack enough Western weapons to succeed without suffering too many casualties.

In a message on Twitter on May 12, Zelenskiy said that while Ukraine's path ahead remained difficult, the country was "stronger now than at any other time of the confrontation with this empire," before ending with message by saying, "Our time is the time for victory!"

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Moscow Denies Ukraine's Claims Of Frontline Advances, Says It Has Repelled Attacks - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty