New Russian attacks near Bakhmut and Ugledar. Kharkiv was shelled

On Saturday, the Russian army continued shelling of Ukraine and attacks near Bakhmut and Ugledar in the Donetsk region.

On February 18, Russian pro-Kremlin mass media and Telegram channels reported on the advance of units of “PMC Wagner” north of Bakhmut in the village of Paraskovievka. This is one of the targeted daily attacks of the Russian troops, which are trying to encircle Bakhmut after months of heavy fighting. In recent weeks, Russian troops have advanced to the north of the city, cutting the road from Bakhmut to Slavyansk. However, on Saturday, Ukrainian sources claim that to the southwest of Bakhmut, the Armed Forces of Ukraine managed to push back some Russian units in the area of ​​the village of Ivanovskoe, where the second road from the city passes. It is extremely difficult to obtain independent confirmation of these data in the context of military operations.

The spokesman of the joint press center of the Defense Forces of the Tavriysky direction, Colonel of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Aleksey Dmytrashkovsky, said on the air of the telethon on February 18 that during the night from Friday to Saturday, the Russian troops made only two attempts to shoot at the area of ​​the front near Ugledar. “Although it is very difficult to call this an assault. They were attacking with a motorized rifle unit. This unit has no equipment at all, no armor support,” said Dmytrashkovsky. According to him, the weakening of the Russian offensive in this direction is connected with the problems that were stated by the head of the “Wagner PMC” Yevgeny Prigozhin: “Wagner’s PMC was left without weapons, without the support of the military, and this is evidenced by the prisoners who are with us.” They say that they have no medical help at all,” said the speaker of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences.

On Saturday morning, a large-scale air alert was declared in Ukraine due to a new Russian missile attack. The head of the Khmelnytskyi regional state administration, Sergey Gamaly, reported that there were two explosions in Khmelnytskyi. The head of the Nikolaev regional administration Vitaly Kim said that Russia launched missiles from ships in the Black Sea, some of which were shot down. In Khmelnytskyi, two people were lightly wounded, but the residential sector was badly damaged. One wounded in Nikolaev.

The head of the administration of Kharkiv region, Oleg Synegubov, wrote in his Telegram channel that on February 18, the Russian army again bombarded villages and cities in the region. In the village of Kovsharivka, two people were wounded, in Volchansk, one local resident was killed and two more were wounded. In Kupyansk, garages and two cars were burned down due to shelling, and in the village of Dvukhletnyaya zaskusnya, the ambulance station received damage.

On Saturday night, the city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region came under rocket fire. This was reported by the chairman of the regional administration, Pavel Kyrylenko. “Fortunately, there were no casualties, but there is damage: six residential buildings, three educational institutions and the central square are damaged,” Kyrylenko said.

Russian authorities deny accusations of intentional strikes on civilian targets during the invasion of Ukraine by their forces.