Dmytro Lykhovii, a spokesman for the Ukrainian army, confirmed the loss of Lastochkyne on national TV.
The Ukrainian army announced on Monday that it had retreated from the village of Lastochkyne in eastern Ukraine, where it faced a stronger Russian force.
According to the Russian state media RIA Novosti, a local Russian commander, Andrei Mordvichev, said that they had pushed the Ukrainian troops 10 kilometers back and were pursuing them further.
The media also reported that the village of Lastochkyne was a strategic point for the Ukrainian supply line.
Dmytro Lykhovii, a spokesman for the Ukrainian army, confirmed the loss of Lastochkyne on national TV. He said that the village was situated west of Avdiivka, a suburb of Donetsk that the Russian army had taken over on February 18 after a long battle.
The Russian Defense Ministry claimed that they had “freed” Lastochkyne from the Ukrainian control.
The withdrawal from the village shows the difficulties Ukraine is facing in the war. Some Western analysts said that the Russian army was launching a major offensive on four fronts in the northeast, trying to advance further into the Donetsk region and also into the neighboring Kharkiv region.
The Ukrainian Defense Minister, Rustan Umerov, expressed his frustration on Sunday that only half of the Western military aid that was promised to Ukraine had arrived. He said that this affected the military planning and the safety of the soldiers.
The Western leaders pledged to support Ukraine until it defeats Russia, and the Bulgarian Prime Minister, Nikolay Denkov, visited Kyiv on Monday to show his solidarity.
A large group of European and other Western officials gathered in Paris on Monday to discuss the war situation, which the French President, Emmanuel Macron, called “critical”. He said that Ukraine needed more military assistance and that it would probably need it for a long time.
The US President, Joe Biden, also tried to facilitate more aid to Ukraine, and invited the four main leaders of the Congress to the White House on Tuesday.
