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NicopolisOn the 500th day since the Russian invasion and with the war continuing, Ukrainian forces are slowly advancing without sufficient weapons and ammunition and with their major cities under constant threat.
Since the beginning of June, the Ukrainian army has launched an offensive to recapture the territories occupied by Russian forces in the east and south.
While the Russian forces incurred fierce resistance.
Russian forces have “built strong fortifications and have a lot of equipment,” said Antonina Murakhovska, a 73-year-old retired teacher in the southern Ukrainian city of Nikopol.
“I see how our troops are advancing. It’s not easy for them in this heat. I think about them all the time, bad things.”
“It will be difficult, but we will win,” she told AFP. “I don’t think it will be soon, but we will win.”
Despite receiving billions of euros in Western military aid, the Ukrainian army has only been able to retake dozens of villages and a few hundred square kilometers of territory since the offensive began.
There is no comparison to last year when Ukrainian forces recaptured 9,000 square kilometers in the Kharkiv region in September and 5,000 square kilometers in the Kherson region in November.
In the run-up to the NATO summit next week, the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky It pressured Western powers to obtain long-range weapons and F-16 fighter jets.
“The offensive is not fast, that’s a fact. But we are moving forward nonetheless,” he said during a visit to Prague this week.
The Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Army, Valeriy Zalogny, also expressed frustration with the slow delivery of promised weapons from the West.
Zaluzhny told The Washington Post last month that it “displeases me” that some in the West are complaining about the slow start and progress of the long-awaited push against Russian forces.
At a street market in Nikopol, Lyudmila Chudinova, 82, said her thoughts focused on her 49-year-old son, a volunteer fighter recovering from a wound.
She said she had come to buy him potatoes.
With tears in her eyes, she said: “I am very afraid that, having recovered, he will again be sent to the front.”
The Ukrainians remain united in the effort to push back the Russian forces but their resilience is constantly tested.
The United Nations has documented the deaths of 9,000 civilians, including more than 500 children, in the conflict so far.
Real losses could be much higher.
Despite the significant buildup of Ukraine’s air defense capabilities this year, the threat of drone and missile attacks across the country persists.
In June, a missile hit a restaurant in Kramatorsk in the east killing 13 people, and on Thursday 10 people were killed in a raid on the western city of Lviv, which has so far been spared the daily bombings of other parts of Ukraine.
The city of Nikopol, near the front line in the south, is regularly bombed by Russian forces, and half of its pre-war population of 100,000 has left.
It is located on the western shore of the Kakhovka Reservoir – just 10 kilometers from Zaporizhia A nuclear power plant that has been under the control of Russian forces since March 2022.
In the past few days, the threat of a nuclear catastrophe has loomed large in the region as Moscow and Kiev accuse each other of preparing to blow up the plant.
The region was already hit hard by an explosion at the Kakhovka Dam on June 6, which caused major floods and killed dozens of people.
Ukraine accused Russia of deliberately blowing up the dam to slow down the counterattack.
Upstream from the dam, the Kakhovka Reservoir – 100 km long and up to 10 km wide – runs out.
As a result, drinking water was cut off in several regions, such as Nikopol.
Morakowska, wearing an elegant white hat in the scorching sun, spoke to AFP at a water distribution point to fill some containers with drinking water.
Sirens blared as Morakowska spoke, eliciting an emotional response from a Nikopol resident who lives under constant threat from Russian bombing.
“When the alarm bell goes off like that, I always think the same thing. I hope all the (Russian) bastards die,” she said.
Since the beginning of June, the Ukrainian army has launched an offensive to recapture the territories occupied by Russian forces in the east and south.
While the Russian forces incurred fierce resistance.
Russian forces have “built strong fortifications and have a lot of equipment,” said Antonina Murakhovska, a 73-year-old retired teacher in the southern Ukrainian city of Nikopol.
“I see how our troops are advancing. It’s not easy for them in this heat. I think about them all the time, bad things.”
“It will be difficult, but we will win,” she told AFP. “I don’t think it will be soon, but we will win.”
Despite receiving billions of euros in Western military aid, the Ukrainian army has only been able to retake dozens of villages and a few hundred square kilometers of territory since the offensive began.
There is no comparison to last year when Ukrainian forces recaptured 9,000 square kilometers in the Kharkiv region in September and 5,000 square kilometers in the Kherson region in November.
In the run-up to the NATO summit next week, the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky It pressured Western powers to obtain long-range weapons and F-16 fighter jets.
“The offensive is not fast, that’s a fact. But we are moving forward nonetheless,” he said during a visit to Prague this week.
The Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Army, Valeriy Zalogny, also expressed frustration with the slow delivery of promised weapons from the West.
Zaluzhny told The Washington Post last month that it “displeases me” that some in the West are complaining about the slow start and progress of the long-awaited push against Russian forces.
At a street market in Nikopol, Lyudmila Chudinova, 82, said her thoughts focused on her 49-year-old son, a volunteer fighter recovering from a wound.
She said she had come to buy him potatoes.
With tears in her eyes, she said: “I am very afraid that, having recovered, he will again be sent to the front.”
The Ukrainians remain united in the effort to push back the Russian forces but their resilience is constantly tested.
The United Nations has documented the deaths of 9,000 civilians, including more than 500 children, in the conflict so far.
Real losses could be much higher.
Despite the significant buildup of Ukraine’s air defense capabilities this year, the threat of drone and missile attacks across the country persists.
In June, a missile hit a restaurant in Kramatorsk in the east killing 13 people, and on Thursday 10 people were killed in a raid on the western city of Lviv, which has so far been spared the daily bombings of other parts of Ukraine.
The city of Nikopol, near the front line in the south, is regularly bombed by Russian forces, and half of its pre-war population of 100,000 has left.
It is located on the western shore of the Kakhovka Reservoir – just 10 kilometers from Zaporizhia A nuclear power plant that has been under the control of Russian forces since March 2022.
In the past few days, the threat of a nuclear catastrophe has loomed large in the region as Moscow and Kiev accuse each other of preparing to blow up the plant.
The region was already hit hard by an explosion at the Kakhovka Dam on June 6, which caused major floods and killed dozens of people.
Ukraine accused Russia of deliberately blowing up the dam to slow down the counterattack.
Upstream from the dam, the Kakhovka Reservoir – 100 km long and up to 10 km wide – runs out.
As a result, drinking water was cut off in several regions, such as Nikopol.
Morakowska, wearing an elegant white hat in the scorching sun, spoke to AFP at a water distribution point to fill some containers with drinking water.
Sirens blared as Morakowska spoke, eliciting an emotional response from a Nikopol resident who lives under constant threat from Russian bombing.
“When the alarm bell goes off like that, I always think the same thing. I hope all the (Russian) bastards die,” she said.
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