Avdiivka – symbol of the Ukrainian resistance movement, now in control of the Russian army

The city is now mostly destroyed and abandoned.

Paris:

Ukraine’s withdrawal of troops from the city of Avdievka gives Vladimir Putin a major symbolic victory ahead of Russia’s presidential election in March and exposes a severe shortage of weapons and soldiers in Kiev.

– Symbol of the Ukrainian resistance movement –

Avdivka is a small industrial city in the eastern Donbas region that has been a symbol of Ukraine’s resistance to Russian aggression since 2014.

It is close to the city of Donetsk, which is controlled as the capital by pro-Russian separatists. Moscow-backed militants briefly seized power in July 2014 before Ukrainian forces regained control.

The city is now largely destroyed and abandoned, with the vast majority of the pre-war population of around 34,000 people having fled.

Avdievka “has been a symbol of Ukraine’s battlefield resolve and Russia’s military failure,” said Ivan Klishz, an analyst at the Estonian Center for International Defense and Security.

But Gustav Gressel, senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, added that this was “strategically insignificant.”

He said that “this is a good step for Ukraine’s offensive on the city of Donetsk” but that Ukraine will not be able to conduct such an offensive for at least two years and “it makes no sense to sacrifice soldiers now.”

Avdievka was a “major victory” for Vladimir Putin, according to the American Institute for War Studies. Putin’s re-election as Russia’s president in March is all but certain, and the opposition will be silenced or exiled.

– The odds are against Ukraine –

A spokesman for one of Ukraine’s top military units said the months-long battle for Avdievka was even more bloody than the battle for Bakhmut. Bakhmut is another eastern industrial city claimed by Russian paramilitary group Wagner in May 2023.

Alexander Borodin of Ukraine’s 3rd Assault Brigade pointed out that Russia has deployed heavy equipment and air power on a large scale and has carried out heavy bombing of Ukrainian positions in recent days.

Russia said before the withdrawal from Ukraine that it was using “large numbers” of armored personnel carriers, Soviet-era combat vehicles, aircraft and drones to carry out tank attacks against infantry, while Wagner was sending mainly men into the Bakhmut front.

Gressel said that despite Avdivka’s defenses having been strengthened since 2014 and inflicting heavy losses since October, Russian forces managed to “infiltrate the city itself” in mid-January.

He added that in the past two weeks, Ukraine’s communication lines have been cut off or threatened, and some areas have faced attacks from all sides.

Gressel said the delivery of Western F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine was “taking too long” and that Kiev’s forces were short of air-to-air missiles and artillery ammunition, weakening Avdivka’s defenses.

– retreat to hold on –

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told the Munich Security Conference on Saturday that withdrawing troops from Avdievka was the right decision to avoid a siege and save as many lives as possible.

“This does not mean that people retreated a few kilometers and Russia captured something, it did not capture anything,” he added.

Mark Cancian, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the retreat was not surprising because Russia had all but surrounded Avdievka and destroying those forces would be “catastrophic” for Ukraine.

“The corridor out of the city is narrow and under fire. Evacuation will not be easy,” he warned.

The Ukrainian army has been ordered to establish new defense lines in the west and southwest of Avdiivka, and the fighting is far from over.

Philippe Gross of the Foundation for Strategic Studies in Paris said it remains to be seen whether Ukraine can defend the new line of defense and whether Russia has enough reserves to continue the offensive and achieve another breakthrough.

According to European military sources, Ukraine is taking defensive measures to hold out in the long term, resist Russian attacks on the ground and avoid wasting its capabilities while waiting for new assistance from Western countries, especially the United States.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)