This is a major setback for Russia. The Russian Ministry of Defense confirmed and then revised upwards (89 dead) the heavy human losses suffered by the army during a strike by the Ukrainian army, having killed soldiers gathered in a building in Makiivka in the evening of New Year. The Ukrainian army claims to have caused hundreds of deaths. Criticism is mounting against Vladimir Putin’s strategy, while the Russian army continues to bombard the main cities of Ukraine and continues its costly offensive in Donetsk, without success.
- The Kremlin revises Makiivka’s balance sheet on the rise
The toll of the Ukrainian strike carried out on a Russian building in Makiivka (an occupied town in the Donetsk region) on New Year’s Eve finally rose to at least 89 dead. It was the Russian Ministry of Defense which confirmed this figure by official video press release, an extremely rare occurrence, on the evening of December 3. “The number of our dead comrades has reached 89. A commission is investigating the circumstances” of the attack, “said General Sergei Sevrioukov in the image.
It was a HIMARS missile launcher, a weapon supplied by the United States to Ukraine, which enabled this bombardment far behind enemy lines, in one of the strongholds in the hands of pro-Russian separatists since 2014. According to the senior official Russian military, the attack took place at 12:01 a.m. on January 1. “It is already evident that the main cause […] is the ignition and massive use by personnel of mobile phones within range of enemy weapons, contrary to the ban,” General Sevryukov explained.
- Ukraine claims much higher toll
Ukraine has admitted having carried out this strike, giving the date of December 31, before the New Year, and claims contradictory information. The strategic communications department of the Ukrainian army thus evoked on Telegram, in a particularly flowery language, a balance sheet of 400 dead and 300 wounded. According to the Telegram channel “Rybar”, one of the main pro-Russian sources on the war in Ukraine, the building housed 600 people. According to former separatist commander Igor Strelkov, very familiar with the situation on the ground, the building which housed the Russian soldiers was completely destroyed by the strike because ammunition was stored there. “Almost all the military equipment, which was near the building without the slightest sign of camouflage, was also destroyed,” he wrote on Telegram, estimating the number of victims at “several hundred”.
- Criticism rises in Russia
Rallies took place on Tuesday on Russian territory to pay tribute to the soldiers killed. Their deaths caused shock in Russia, but also criticism of the military command, already embarrassed by a series of humiliating defeats on the Ukrainian front in recent months. “Despite several months of war, certain conclusions have still not been drawn,” notes blogger Boris Rojine, close to pro-Russian Ukrainian separatist circles, castigating the “incompetence” of senior Russian army officers.
Unusually in Russia, where the authorities remain discreet about military losses in Ukraine, around 200 people gathered with the approval of the authorities in Samara (center), where some of the soldiers killed were from. According to local media, rallies were also taking place in other cities in the region, notably in Togliatti and Syzran.
- An EU summit on February 3 in Kyiv?
The information was launched by kyiv, but not confirmed by the European Union: an EU summit should take place in kyiv on February 3 to discuss European financial and military support, according to the office of President Volodymyr Zelensky. The date and subject of the discussions are well validated, but the Ukrainian capital has not yet been officially designated as the venue for the meeting by the Union. “I cannot at this stage confirm the location,” Barend Leyts, spokesman for the President of the European Council, said on Tuesday. This summit was to take place in a reduced committee: it will not bring together the 27 heads of state of the member countries, but only Volodymyr Zelensky, Charles Michel and the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen.
The EU has annual summit meetings with Ukraine. His spokesman said in December that the Ukrainian president had a “standing invitation” from the EU to visit Brussels. This exchange should in particular make it possible to discuss the launch of the new financial aid program for Ukraine, amounting to 18 billion euros, adopted in December by the European Parliament. According to AFP, the Ukrainian president insists that a first contribution be paid to his country during the month.
- Putin orders the screening of propaganda films
This could be an attempt to retain public opinion. Vladimir Putin ordered Tuesday, December 3 to his government to organize by February the projection in the cinema of “documentary films” on the offensive of the forces of Moscow in Ukraine. The Ministry of Culture will thus be responsible for showing these films “in cinema networks on subjects related to the special military operation, the fight against the spread of neo-Nazi and neo-fascist ideology”, can we read in a message published on the Kremlin website. Moscow presents its offensive as a conflict opposing it by proxy to the West, because of the crucial arms deliveries to kyiv.
This decision comes after numerous setbacks suffered by the Russian military in recent months, including the loss of Kharkiv and Kherson, and the Ukrainian strike that killed at least 89 people on New Year’s Eve. Russia has already passed multiple laws to control the discourse around its “special military operation”, the name it gives to the conflict. The law in particular severely punishes all those who disseminate what justice considers to be “lies” about the armed forces.