Residents of the besieged town of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine live in dire conditions, with civilians killed and injured every day, the deputy mayor said this evening, as fighting between Russian troops and Ukrainian forces rage around the city.
Bakhmut is an important target for the Russian military as it slowly advances into the Donetsk region, one of the territories the Kremlin claims it annexed after what Kyiv and the West consider to be sham referendums in September. According to the Ukrainian army, the region is the scene of some of the heaviest fighting.
Deputy Mayor Oleksandr Marchenko told Reuters that Russian troops “attempted to storm the city from several directions”. “Every day it becomes more and more difficult to survive in this city”, Oleksandr Marchenko said from an empty government building, as mortar fire echoed nearby. According to him, more than 120 civilians have been killed in Bakhmout since the February 24 Russian invasion.
“In some districts, we do not know the exact number of people killed, because active fighting is taking place there or the installations are temporarily occupied” by Russian forces, he added. Ukrainian troops “hold the front line firmly”, said Oleksandr Marchenko, while describing the deteriorating humanitarian situation in the city, where the population has fallen from around 80,000 before the war to just 12,000 today. The city has been without electricity, gas and running water for nearly two months.
Residents continue to go outside to shop, collect humanitarian aid or fetch water, despite calls to evacuate, said Oleksandr Marchenko, who added that the winter will be more difficult for the elderly and disabled. “We are holding our ground and hope that the Ukrainian Armed Forces will be able to push the enemy further from the city”did he declare.