As the war entered its 488th day, here were the main developments.
This is the current situation as of Monday, June 26, 2023.
Wagner mutiny
- Wagner commander Yevgeny Prigozhin and his mercenaries withdrew from the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and the Voronezh region following an agreement brokered by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to end their short lives. armed mutiny.
- According to the agreement, the soldiers Participants in the uprising will not be prosecuted and Prigozhin will go into exile in Belarus.
- Lukashenko and Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke by phone on Sunday morning, according to Belarus’s Belta news agency. The two men spoke at least twice on Saturday.
- Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Defense Minister said they held a series of calls with key allies including the United States to discuss Putin’s “weaknesses” and Ukraine’s next counterattack steps. .
- US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the brief uprising against the Kremlin exposed “real crack” in Putin’s administration.
- French President Emmanuel Macron said the uprising had exposed “splits” in the Russian leadership and showed “the fragility of the army and its auxiliary forces”.
- In China’s first official statement on the uprising, the Foreign Ministry said Beijing supports Russia in “protecting national stability”, adding that the matter is “internal affairs”. ministry” of Russia.
- Speaking in his nightly video address, Zelenskyy said Putin is “obviously very scared” and was probably hiding after a brief rebellion.
- The Institute for the Study of War, a US-based think tank, said the Kremlin was “deeply unstable” and that Lukashenko’s direct role in stopping Wagner’s advance was “insult to Putin”.
Fight
Serhiy Cherevatyi, a spokesman for the eastern Ukraine military command, said Kyiv’s troops were 600 meters (2,000 ft) to 1,000 meters (3,281 ft) ahead of the previous day near the city of Bakhmut. carried out by Wagner’s forces in May after months of fighting.
The Russian Defense Ministry says it has repelled several new attacks by Ukrainian forces in four front-line areas in eastern Ukraine, including 10 attacks near Bakhmut alone.
Putin told state television that he is in regular contact with the Defense Ministry and that Russia remains confident in carrying out its plans regarding what it calls a “special military operation” in Ukraine.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said the death toll in a Russian missile attack on the Ukrainian capital on Friday night had risen to five after two more bodies were found in a damaged high-rise building. heavy damage.
