In a statement on Telegram, the Russian Defense Ministry said it had captured the localities of Sredneïe and Kleban-Byk in this region. The taking of this last mark one more step towards the city of Kostyantynivka, an important bastion on the road to Kramatorsk which is an important point for the Ukrainian logistics on the front of the Donetsk region. The Russian army has increased its territorial gains in recent months against less numerous and less well equipped Ukrainian forces.
These advances occur when the prospect of a meeting between the Russian and Ukrainian presidents, Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky, announced by the American leader Donald Trump and aimed at finding a peaceful settlement of the conflict, is moving away. The Russian diplomacy chief Sergei Lavrov accused the Ukrainian president of blocking the organization of a possible meeting with his Russian counterpart on Friday, the day after Moscow’s Ukrainian criticism.
For his part, Donald Trump, who wants to quickly find an outcome to the Russian against Ukraine launched in 2022 and has made a spectacular rapprochement with Moscow in recent months to get there, announced Friday to give himself “two weeks“To decide on its line concerning this conflict. The Russian army currently occupies around 20% of the Ukrainian territory.