Russia confirmed on Tuesday the beginning of a new phase of the war with Ukraine in the Donbas region, in the east of the country, according to statements by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
Lavrov referred to this “another phase” of the “special operation” as a “very important moment.”
In an interview with Indian television, the minister was asked if Russia was considering the use of nuclear weapons.
“Only conventional weapons”answered.
Ukrainian officials have recently warned the West about Moscow’s possible use of tactical nuclear weapons.
At the start of the war, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered Russian deterrence forces (including nuclear weapons) to high alert and a number of Russian government officials have hinted that the country would be willing to use them under certain circumstances.
The confirmation of this new phase by Russia occurs one day after the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, anticipated that this expected offensive started in the east of his country.
70,000 Russian troops
“The operation in eastern Ukraine is aimed, as announced from the beginning, at completely liberating the (self-proclaimed) Donetsk and Luhansk republics. And this operation will continue,” Lavrov said.
“Another stage of this operation begins, and I am sure it will be a very important moment in this entire special operation,” he added.
For several weeks, Moscow has been massing reinforcements in the Donbas region, according to the Institute for the Study of War.
US officials say Russia has 76 battle groups in the east, adding 11 in recent days. These groups normally comprise between 700 and 900 soldiers plus military equipment.
According to Ukrainian estimates, in total there are more than 700,000 Russian troops in Donbas.
Russian security policy expert Aglaya Snetkov notes that there are believed to be another 22 battle groups around the devastated southern Ukrainian port city of Mariupol.
If that key city falls, it would allow those forces to move north and join the fight in Donbas, which could be important but not necessarily decisive.
Why does this region matter?
Donbas is a former coal and steel-producing region in Ukraine. This area also includes the Luhansk and Donetsk regions, which stretch from the outskirts of Mariupol in the south to the northern border.
“The key is that they have been identified by the Kremlin as the Russophone parts of Ukraine that are more Russian than Ukrainian,” explains Sam Cranny-Evans of the Royal Untited Services Institute.
But different experts indicate that this they do not imply that the regions are pro-Russian.
Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, has repeatedly made the baseless accusation that Ukraine has carried out genocide in the east.
When the war began, almost two-thirds of the eastern regions were in the hands of Ukraine. The rest was run by Russian proxies, who created small states backed by Moscow during a war that began eight years ago.
Just before the war, Putin recognized the two eastern regions as independent from Ukraine.
If Russia were to conquer both great regions, the next step would be to annex them as Putin already did with the Crimean peninsula in 2014 after a controversial referendum, according to experts. (I)
Source: Eluniverso
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