Ukraine on Monday claimed to have taken full control of Irpin near the capital Kyiv on the 33rd day of the war, news agency Reuters reported.
“We have good news today – Irpin has been liberated,” the mayor Oleksandr Markushyn said in a video post on Telegram. “We understand that there will be more attacks on our town and we will defend it courageously, he added.
Irpin has been one of the hotspots where fighting between the Russian and Ukrainian forces. Facing a stiff resistance, Moscow is now turning to crush Ukrainian resistance in the east to force a surrender to end the war. The Russian forces on Friday had declared that the first phase of ‘military operation’ was over and the focus was now on liberating Donbas region.
U.S. and British officials also have noted that Moscow has increasingly focused on fighting the Ukrainian forces in the east while digging in around Kyiv and other big cities and pummelling them with rockets and artillery.
The Russian claims come amid Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy saying that Kyiv was ready to remain neutral and compromise on the Donbas region. But Ukraine has alleged that Russia was planning to split the country into two along the lines of two Koreas.
“After a failure to capture Kyiv and remove Ukraine’s government, Putin is changing his main operational directions. These are south and east,” Ukraine’s intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov said.
The allegations come amid the proposed in-person talks between Russia and Ukraine this week in Turkey. Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said that the talks between Putin and Zelenskyy could be counter-productive.