Violent clashes continue in Ukraine's Donetsk region

By Burc Eruygur

ISTANBUL (AA) - Violent clashes in Ukraine's Donetsk region continue 13 months into the start of the Moscow-Kyiv war, with the cities of Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Vuhledar being major hotspots in the fighting.

On the Donetsk front, clashes in Bakhmut have been the most significant.

Russian forces have been trying for months to capture Bakhmut, a transport and logistics hub in Ukraine’s Donetsk, which is part of the largely Russian-speaking industrialized Donbas region.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner paramilitary group involved in Russia's "special military operation," claimed earlier this month that the city had almost been encircled.

However, Ukrainian forces continue to defend the city, where Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made a surprise visit to last Wednesday.

Elsewhere, the city of Avdiivka has been subject to missile strikes, most recently last Sunday, when Russian missiles struck two apartment blocks in the city, according to the head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office, Andriy Yermak.

The largest missile strike to happen in Donetsk in the past week took place in the city of Sloviansk, where one person was killed and 25 were injured.

On the same day, two Russian missiles also hit an orphanage in the city of Druzhkivka, according to the region's governor Pavlo Kyrylenko.

Now in its second year, Russia’s war on Ukraine has so far killed 8,401 civilians and wounded 14,023 others, according to the latest UN figures.