Russia tries to press its offensive into Ukraine's east

Pokrovsk: Russian forces tried on Monday to press their offensive deeper into eastern Ukraine after taking control of a key stronghold.

The Ukrainian military confirmed that its forces had withdrawn from the city of Lysychansk, the last bulwark of Ukrainian resistance in the Luhansk province, one of the two regions that make up the country's eastern industrial heartland of Donbas. The Russians also control about half of Donetsk, the second province of Donbas.

Luhansk governor Serhii Haidai said Ukrainian forces retreated from Lysychansk to avoid being surrounded.

There was a risk of Lysychansk encirclement, Haidai told the Associated Press, adding that Ukrainian troops could have held on for a few more weeks but would have potentially paid too high a price.

We managed to do centralised withdrawal and evacuate all injured, Haidai said. We took back all the equipment, so from this point withdrawal was organized well.

Then Ukrainian General Staff said Russian forces were now focusing their efforts on pushing toward the line of Siversk, Fedorivka and Bakhmut in the Donetsk region. The Russian army has also intensified its shelling of the key Ukrainian strongholds of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk, deeper in Donetsk.

On Sunday, six people, including a 9-year-old girl, were killed in the Russian shelling of Sloviansk and another 19 people were wounded, according to local authorities. Kramatorsk also came under fire on Sunday.

An intelligence briefing Monday from the British Defense Ministry supported the Ukrainian military's assessment, noting that Russian forces will now almost certainly switch to capturing Donetsk. The briefing said the conflict in Donbas has been grinding and attritional, and is unlikely to change in the coming weeks.

While the Russian army has a massive advantage in firepower, military analysts say that it doesn't have any significant superiority in the number of troops. That means Moscow lacks resources for quick land gains and can only advance slowly, relying on heavy artillery and rocket barrages to soften Ukrainian defenses.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has made capturing the entire Donbas a key goal in his war in Ukraine, now in its fifth month. Moscow-backed separatists in Donbas have battled Ukrainian forces since 2014 when they declared independence from Kyiv after the Russian annexation of Ukraine's Crimea. Russia formally recognized the self-proclaimed republics days before its February 24 invasion of Ukraine.

Putin's defense minister reported to him Sunday that the Russian army and its separatist allies now hold all of the Luhansk region after taking full control of Lysychansk.

In his nightly video address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy acknowledged the withdrawal, but vowed that Ukrainian forces will fight their way back.

Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday declared victory in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk, one day after Ukrainian forces withdrew from their last remaining bulwark of resistance in the province. Russia's Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu reported to Putin in a televised meeting Monday that Russian forces had taken control of Luhansk, which together with the neighbouring Donetsk province makes up Ukraine's industrial heartland

of Donbas.