Russian general on Friday claimed that Russia’s ambitions in Ukraine extend outside the Donbas region and stretch across the country's southern districts.
"Since the start of the second phase of the special operation...one of the tasks of the Russian army is to establish full control over the Donbas and southern Ukraine," Major General Rustam Minnekaev told Russian news agencies.
UKRAINE ACCUSES RUSSIA OF LEAVING UP TO 9,000 KILLED IN MARIUPOL IN MASS GRAVES
The general’s comments come one day after Russian President Vladimir Putin declared victory over the Mariupol, despite the thousands of resistance fighters that remain bunkered in the southeastern port city.
The Pentagon continues to assess that Mariupol is still contested and has yet to fall to Russian forces.
Mariupol is a strategically important port city, not only because of its access to the Sea of Azov and the direct coast-to-coast access it would grant Russia – but because of Moscow’s strategy for eastern Ukraine.
Defense officials have said that Russia is planning to pinch the Luhansk and Donetsk regions by invading from the north through Kharkiv and up from the south through Mariupol.
But the general’s Friday statements suggest that cities as far south as Odesa could be seeing a similar fight to the ongoing battle in Mariupol.
UKRAINE SAYS RUSSIA WON'T ALLOW EVACUATIONS FROM MARIUPOL STEEL PLANT, TRY TO FORCE SURRENDER
When announcing his "special military operation" in Ukraine, Putin said he has no intention of occupying Ukraine and claimed his forces would "demilitarize and denazify the country."
But Minnekaev on Friday said the goal was not only to create a land bridge between the Donbas and occupied Crimea but to gain superiority over all Black Sea ports – extending its coastal access outside the Sea of Azov.
"Control over the south of Ukraine is another way out to Transnistria, where there are cases of Russian-speaking people being oppressed," Minnekaev said, in an apparent threat to Moldova.
Transnistria is an unrecognized breakaway state in Moldova sympathetic to Russia.
Though a peace treaty between Transnistria and the Moldovan government since 1992, the breakaway state has similarities to the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics in the Donbas which served as Putin’s justification for his illegal invasion in February.
Minnekaev’s comments suggest that Moldova could be next to face off with Russia.
India 'want the Russians out' of Ukraine, UK PM says
More now from the UK PM's news conference in India - where he's been speaking about the war in Ukraine.
Boris Johnson is questioned about his discussions with India's Prime Minister Modi, and whether he's asked Modi to use his influence in Moscow to put pressure on Russia.
Johnson says Modi has been “very strong” in his language about what’s happened in Bucha - where Russian forces are accused of having carried out atrocities on civilians.
He says it's clear “he has already intervened several times… really to ask [Vladimir Putin] what on earth he thinks he’s doing and where he thinks this is going”.
He says India wants peace “and they want the Russians out”, adding “I totally agree with that”.
Thats it for today
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