Ukraine blows up bridges in Bakhmut and moves some units to safer positions

• Conflict Russian Defense Minister goes to the front in eastern Ukraine amid heavy fighting in Bakhmut

• Bakhmut contention, a hell of ice and mud

The heavy fighting in and around Bakhmut could soon come to a head.

Ukrainian forces defending the city are facing

.

"Ukrainian forces seem to be setting the conditions for a controlled withdrawal of parts of Bakhmut," the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said on Saturday.

Russian artillery struck the last exit routes from Bakhmut on Friday, aiming to

.

The UK Ministry of Defense tweeted that kyiv is "reinforcing the area with elite units".

They are also

, another indication of withdrawal.

"Regular forces of the Russian army and Wagner Group have advanced into the northern suburbs of the city, which is now a Ukrainian-controlled salient, vulnerable to Russian attacks from three sides. "Ukrainian-held supply routes outside from the city are becoming more limited," says the British army. Even so, Ukrainian soldiers were working to repair damaged roads and more troops were moving to the front. To the west, the Ukrainians were digging new trenches for defensive

positions

Denys Yaroslavskyi, commander of a Ukrainian army unit in Bakhmut, admitted to Espreso TV that parts of some units had been ordered to rotate to

, describing the situation on Friday as "a slaughterhouse on both sides".

One of the reasons that Putin used to try to justify his war was the

.

But his invasion has reduced to rubble precisely cities where Russian was spoken and he has sent into exile or mass graves Ukrainians who also used to speak Russian.

long siege

Since May Russian forces have been fighting to capture Bakhmut - a city that once numbered about 70,000 before it was razed to the ground by the Russians - and have suffered "devastating" casualties in the process.

Today Bakhmut is destroyed, but Moscow is aiming for

.

After the bloodiest fighting of the war, controlling that space is a step towards more important areas of Donbas.

The Russian agency RIA Novosti reported that the former prosecutor general of Ukraine,

, spoke about an order to leave the city received in the last hours.

There he has been performing the role of drone operator.

The Russian media point out the importance of the city not so much for Russia but for wresting kyiv a

.

Ukraine believes that, despite everything, the Russians have been more worn out.

In the battles for Bakhmut, the Russians lose seven times more soldiers than the Ukrainian Armed Forces, said

, secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine.

fight for victory

Before the Russian victory occurred, it already had several parents.

Evgeni Prigozhin, founder of Russia's Wagner mercenary force, boasted in a video posted on Friday that Bakhmut was "practically surrounded" by his forces and that Ukrainian soldiers had only one path left: retreat.

For his part, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu paid a

, his office said on Saturday.

Unlike Volodimir Zelensky, both President Vladimir Putin and his ministers have been very careful not to go near the front.

But Bakhmut is a relatively important piece after

.

Shoigu "inspected the forward command post of one of the formations of the Eastern Military District south of Donetsk."

The minister and Wagner's boss compete for a place on the war stage.

Prigozhin accused the minister and other commanders of "treason" last month.

The cost in men has been enormous for both sides.

Prigozhin posted a video on Saturday showing coffins that he said contained the bodies of Ukrainian soldiers who were being repatriated to kyiv-controlled territory.

"There is no mass withdrawal"

A spokesperson for the Ukrainian Armed Forces this morning denied claims of a massive withdrawal of Ukrainian troops.

"The fighting in Bakhmut is more on the outskirts, with the city controlled by the Ukrainian defense forces: the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the Border Guard and the National Guard, and there is also no massive withdrawal

," he told CNN Serhiy Cherevatyi, the spokesman for the eastern grouping of the armed forces.

More than 150 Russian soldiers were killed, 239 wounded, and three taken prisoner, he added.

Bakhmut Deputy Mayor

, explained to BBC-Radio that there was fighting in the city and also street battles but thanks to the Ukrainian armed forces they have not yet taken control of the city.

A woman was killed and two men seriously injured by shelling as they tried to cross a makeshift bridge out of Bakhmut on Saturday, Ukrainian troops helping them said.

As reported by

, many people flee on foot to avoid the danger of the vehicle being hit.

Ukraine's defense minister

has said that he is confident that Western countries will supply fighter jets to Kiev and that he is optimistic that

.

Ukraine hopes to receive "two or three different types" of fighter jets and believes that "it will be done again through a kind of coalition," he said in an interview with the German newspaper

.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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