So the situation then at the front has worsened.
That is the admission from
Ukraine's top commander, as he said,
that Kiev's outnumbered troops have fallen back to new positions
West of three villages on the eastern front,
where Russia has concentrated significant forces in several locations.
Retreat there is Kiev hopes it can stabilise its forces
again while it takes delivery of US weapons under that
$61 billion aid package approved in the US last week.
What we're going to cross then live to keep.
Talk to our correspondents who joins us from there?
Gulliver, Crown, Gulliver. Firstly, then,
give us the latest position that you're hearing on the
ground,
can you?
Well, Colin. Colonel General Alexander Siski named three villages in
Donetsk region that he said Ukrainian troops had withdrawn from
one of them southwest of Donetsk,
two of them in the Avdiivka direction,
beyond Avdiivka to the northwest of Donetsk city and Avdiivka.
The Russians are saying that they've gone further than that.
And some independent observers are also assessing the amount of
terrain that the Russians have gained in recent weeks as
a bit bigger than what
Lyrsky is admitting to. But he said it's not only
in Donetsk region that the Ukrainians are under pressure.
Of course there's also in Donetsk region.
We shouldn't forget this key battle for the town of
Chasiv Yaar.
Colonel Stewski didn't
Ukrainian retreat in that area,
but he said the fighting there was very intense.
And then outside Donetsk region to the north,
on the border between Luhansk region and Harkiv region,
He said there that the Russians had had some partial
success in their advance towards trying to retake the city
of Kukjansk,
which is just inside Hakiv region.
But the Russians have been trying to do this for
months and months,
they really only inching forward.
So it's important not to exaggerate the scale of these
Russian gains.
But the Ukrainians are admitting very much that they're on
the back foot,
including also in the South,
though General Sirsky said that in the South they were
holding the line and the Russians hadn't managed to advance
Gulliver. A lot of talk,
of course, about the need for these new weapons to
arrive,
but there's also a big lack of manpower,
isn't there? Mobilisation, a key issue,
yes. That's the other key problem for the Ukrainian armed
forces.
They're absolutely outmanned. It's hard to put any numbers on
it because of course they're very,
very tight lipped about it.
But you know, you hear soldiers saying that they've only
got half the manpower that they need in their brigade
or their battalion,
and they're really struggling the Ukrainians to recruit more people.
I think that may be one of the reasons that
General Sirsky is being quite candid about Ukrainian withdrawals from
these villages in Donetsk region.
Because he has a reputation
after the battle for backmoot,
For being the guy that wants to hold out to
the last at huge cost in human lives and won't
retreat,
won't make a tactical retreat,
even when it seems like the sensible thing to do.
He wants to prove that that is not the case,
that he is willing to make tactical retreats,
soldiers lives. In all of his statements,
he puts the emphasis on the need to save Ukrainian
soldiers lives because of course,
he is very aware that one of the main reasons
people don't want to join the army is because they
don't want to die.
And the Ukrainians are taking very,
very heavy losses. At the moment.
The mobilization effort is not going well.
We hear more and more reports of desertions and hundreds
of thousands of Ukrainian men are believed to have left
the country illegally the moment.
The Ukrainian public opinion doesn't seem to be very impressed
with the
government's ways of trying to boost mobilisation.
The new mobilisation law has much more
than carrot in it. It aims to boost
ways for the government to catch men and make it
harder for them to avoid the military recruiters.
A lot of people are saying they need a whole
different approach to go for recruiting,
to go for trying to really motivate people more.
I was thinking we might hear some kind of big
motivational speech from Vladimir's Zelensky wants the United States voted,
decide to say, look, now the weapons are coming,
you're going to have the weapons you need,
and so you know, we need to count on you.
And he hasn't said anything of the sort.
He seems very unwilling the Ukrainian president to really kind
of own this mobilisation drive.