On Wednesday, Valery Gerasimov, the chief of the general staff, was named by Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu as the overall commander of what Moscow refers to as its “special military operation” in Ukraine, which is currently in its eleventh month.
General Sergei Surovikin, who had only been appointed in October to head the invasion and direct intense attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, was inadvertently demoted by the change.
In the meantime, Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of Wagner and a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, claimed that his forces had completely taken Soledar after fierce combat and killed about 500 Ukrainian soldiers.
“I want to confirm the complete liberation and cleansing of the territory of Soledar,” Prigozhin said in a statement.
“The whole city is littered with the corpses of Ukrainian soldiers,” he said.
U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters on Wednesday he could not corroborate reports that Soledar was in Russian hands.
Donetsk governor Pavlo Kyrylenko told Ukrainian state TV that 559 civilians remain in Soledar, including 15 children, and it was impossible to evacuate them due to ongoing fighting. The town had a pre-war population of around 10,500.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy mocked previous Wagner claims to have seized part of Soledar but made no immediate comment on the latest assertions.
“The terrorist state and its propagandists are trying to pretend that part of our town of Soledar … is some sort of a Russian possession,” Zelenskiy said in a video address. “But fighting continues.”
In a statement on Facebook, the Ukrainian military general staff said Russian forces were suffering heavy losses as they tried to take Soledar and sever Ukrainian supply lines.
In its Thursday morning roundup of reports from the frontlines, the Ukraine military command mentioned tanks and artillery in the Soledar area, but offered no other details.
Russia has struggled to cement control over the town, which would be Russia’s most substantial gain since August after a series of retreats before Ukrainian counter-offensives in the east and south.
Ukrainian military analyst Oleh Zhdanov said the situation in Soledar was “approaching that of critical”.
“The Ukrainian armed forces are holding their positions. About one half of the town is under our control. Fierce fighting is going on near the town centre,” he said on YouTube.
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