President Biden has said Russia has suffered more than 100,000 killed and wounded troops in the fight for the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.
The U.S. president was speaking on Sunday at the G7 summit in Japan, as Russia and Ukraine issued competing claims over the situation on the ground in the besieged city.
On Saturday Russia claimed to have finally captured the city but Ukraine on Sunday denied it had fallen and said fighting was continuing.
Biden said: “Bakhmut. There’s a discussion about whether or not it’s been lost or whatever.
“Well, the truth of the matter is the Russians have suffered over 100,000 casualties in Bakhmut.
“And that’s hard to make up.”
📹 Russia has lost 100,000 troops in #Bakhmut, US President Joe #Biden said in #Hiroshima. pic.twitter.com/TfB4tfEyzJ
— KyivPost (@KyivPost) May 21, 2023
Earlier this week, Ukraine’s General Staff has claimed the total number of Russian troops killed or wounded during its full-scale invasion of Ukraine had surpassed 200,000.
The figure means Russia has lost a number of troops so large – 200,590 – it surpasses many countries’ entire serving armed forces.
The official Ukrainian number is roughly corroborated by other sources. At a briefing on 29 March, UK Secretary of State for Defence Ben Wallace estimated Russia’s full-scale invasion casualties – those killed and wounded – had already surpassed 220,000.
The situation in Bakhmut
The Ukrainian army on Sunday said it retained control of an "insignificant" part of Bakhmut, the eastern city that Russia claims to have captured, but was advancing on its flanks.
A day earlier Russia's Wagner mercenary group and regular army claimed to have fully taken control of Bakhmut, scene of the longest and bloodiest battle in Moscow's invasion.
"Despite the fact that we now control an insignificant part of Bakhmut, the importance of its defence does not lose its relevance," the commander of Ukraine's ground forces, Oleksandr Syrsky, said. "We continue to advance on the flanks in the suburbs of Bakhmut."
Earlier Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told the G7 summit in Hiroshima that Bakhmut was "not occupied". Syrsky said the army would continue to defend Bakhmut.
He called the situation for Ukrainian troops there "difficult but under control."
The chief of Wagner – whose fighters have spearheaded Russia's advance on Bakhmut – insisted there were no Ukrainian troops left in Bakhmut.
"There is not a single Ukrainian soldier in Bakhmut as we have stopped taking prisoners," Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin said in a post on Telegram.
"There are a huge number of corpses of Ukrainian soldiers."
He said that Bakhmut has been "taken to the last centimetre."
Prigozhin said that Zelensky was either not telling the truth or "like many of our own military leaders, simply does not know what is happening on the ground, this is a possibility."
Both sides are believed to have suffered huge losses in the battle for Bakhmut.
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Comments (7)
Hiding their plans is good as much I dislike Wagner. It would make more sense to wait until they leave and then attack the Russian army.
Wagner is being encircled and hopefully the Ukrainians ALSO do not take prisoners!
This from the man who claimed the Hunter laptop story was "Russian disinformation." Unfortunately, there were many who believed him then, and will continue to believe him now, despite his reputation for playing fast and loose with the truth.
The Kleptocrats controlling Russia are very scared. Like all autocracies based on a paper thin veneer of "free" voting they are terrified of the truth. Hence their endless racial lies twisting and turning the minds of young people who are sacrificed on the altar of "Putin the Most Terrible".
One day these evil doers will meet Justice.
So sad to read about the massive loss of human life just to fulfill one man's fantasy to reassemble the former Soviet Union. Putin doesn't care if Russia's native sons die in this war or not. This massive slaughter of human life rests squarely on the shoulders of Vladimir Putin.
In a speech on 16 March 2022, Putin said that Russia should undergo a "self-cleansing of society," to get rid of the "bastards and traitors," as thousands of Russians tried to flee Russia amid its invasion of Ukraine. He was talking about cleansing his own nation's people. We haven't heard talk like "self-cleansing", from a world leader, since World War II. Adolf Hitler spoke openly of cleansing his own country. Vladimir Putin does as well.
We also know that Putin has no problem with extinguishing the lives of innocent children and civilians. Putin's murderous regime has been shelling apartment buildings, targeting civilians, bombing maternity wards, children hospitals, kindergartens, theaters, art schools, primary schools and even churches. So he has no problem killing children.
At this point, there's only one man who can stop him and it's not President Biden, the so-called leader of the free world. It's President Zelensky. He must be given all the necessary weaponry he needs to finish the job.
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Hope so
At huge and unsustainable cost the Orcs have impaled themselves on Bakhmut. They are being enveloped on both flanks. All the Orcs have accomplished is to place themselves in a kill sack.
@Wayne Arrington, exactly!
@Wayne Arrington,
They probably know it. Surely they see death all around them.
@Wayne Arrington, well put.