“The human cost of the battle for control of the city of Severdonetsk is very high for us, it’s just terrible,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said amid a brutal attack by Russian troops in an attempt to capture a strategic city in eastern Ukraine. .

In his daily address to the Ukrainian people, he noted that “military history will undoubtedly remember the battle in Donbass as one of the fiercest in Europe”, explaining that “we have no other choice but to go forward and liberate our lands”, and urged the West to “supply the army” of Ukraine with more weapons.

The governor of the Luhansk region, Sergei Gaidai, confirmed that “Russian forces control 70 to 80 percent of the city of Severodonetsk, but they were unable to encircle or capture it due to fierce Ukrainian resistance.”

He stated that “evacuation from the city has become impossible due to the bombardment of the last bridges”, noting that “the neighboring city of Lysekhansk is also under intense Russian bombardment.”

Severodonetsk is the largest city in the east of the Lugansk region, which is still under the control of Ukraine.