Russia targets eastern Ukraine and says phase one is over.
Written byTimes Magazine
Russia has said it will focus its invasion of Ukraine on "liberating" the east, signaling a possible change in strategy.
The Defense Ministry said the original objectives of the war were over, and Russia had reduced Ukraine's combat capacity.
The Russian invasion was aimed at quickly capturing significant cities and overthrowing the government.
"The main tasks of the first phase of the operation have been completed," said Sergei Rudskoy, head of the Main Operations Department of the General Staff.
The Russian military is bombing and trying to encircle key Ukrainian cities such as the capital Kyiv, which General Rudskoy described as an attempt to link Ukrainian forces elsewhere in the country while Russia focuses on the east.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his forces had dealt a "severe blow" to Russia and urged Moscow to recognize the need for serious peace talks.
"By restraining Russia's actions, our defenders direct the Russian leadership to a simple and logical idea: conversation is necessary. Contents. Very. Precisely. "In the name of results, not because of delays," he said.
Map showing Russian progress and Ukrainian counterattack
The same ultimate goal of the Russian invasion is unclear. Still, President Vladimir Putin described his goals as "demilitarization" and "denazification" of Ukraine. He described government leaders as a neo-Nazi junta that killed millions in the genocide of Russian speakers.
The allegations are baseless, and Ukraine and its Western allies regard it as a pretext for an unnecessary war.
Russian troops first tried to lay siege to the capital Kyiv. But after the bombing and subsequent capture of several towns in the northwest, they were forced to retreat by the Ukrainian army, who were now trying to outflank thousands of Russian troops.
In a US assessment on Friday, a defense official said Russia was making no progress in advancing towards Ukraine's second-largest city, Kharkiv, and Ukraine could retake Kherson.
The Russian army was more successful in the south, capturing cities such as Kherson and some successes in the east.
Moscow now claims that 93% of the Luhansk region in the Donbas is under the control of Russian-backed separatists and 54% of the other Donbas, Donetsk, in their hands. More than a third of the territory was under Separatist control before the war.
Andrei Ermak, head of Ukrainian President Zelenskyy's cabinet, warned against speculation that Russia had abandoned plans to take over the rest of Ukraine. "There is a huge risk that a public prognosis will be made before the end of the war, especially when you are fighting one of the largest armies in the world," Ermak told the Financial Times.
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