Fierce street fighting for key east industrial city

Ukraine will fight to recover all its territory occupied by Russian forces, President Volodymyr Zelensky said yesterday, as his troops struggled to hold their ground in bloody street-to-street fighting in the city of Sievierodonetsk.
“We have already lost too many people to simply cede our territory,” Zelensky said by video link at an event hosted by Britain’s Financial Times newspaper. “We have to achieve a full de-occupation of our entire territory.”
Zelensky’s remarks responded forcefully to suggestions that Ukraine must cede territory to Russia to end the war, now in its fourth month.
French President Emmanuel Macron said in a recent interview it was important not to “humiliate” Moscow, comments interpreted in Ukraine as implying it must accept some Russian demands.
Asked about Macron’s comments, Zelensky said: “We are not going to humiliate anyone, we are going to respond in kind.”
As he spoke, Ukrainian troops in the ruins of Sievierodonetsk were trying to cling to gains Kyiv said its forces had made in a surprise counter-offensive that shifted momentum there last week.
The governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Gaidai, said the defenders were finding it hard to repel Russian attacks in the centre of Sievierodonetsk, a small industrial city in the east.
“The Russians are trying with all their might to capture Sievierodonetsk and cut off the highway from Lysychansk to Bakhmut,” he said in an online post. “In the regional centre it is hard to stave off the attacks, but the occupiers do not control the town.”
In Druzhkivka, in the Ukrainian-held pocket of Donetsk province, residents were sifting through the wreckage of houses obliterated by the latest shelling.
The Donetsk regional governor, Pavlo Kyrylenko, told Ukrainian television there was constant shelling along the front line, with Russia attempting to push towards Sloviansk and Kramatorsk, the two biggest Ukrainian-held cities in Donetsk.
Efforts were underway to evacuate remaining residents, he said: “People are now understanding, though it is late, that it is time to leave.” Ukraine’s second city, Kharkiv, was also hit by shelling early yesterday, and the local mayor said one person was killed. The northeastern city came under intense bombardment in the first two months of the war, but had been quieter in recent weeks after Russian forces retreated in the region.
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said the Russian-occupied Ukrainian ports of Berdyansk and Mariupol were ready to resume grain exports. Ukraine says any such shipments from territory seized by Moscow would amount to illegal looting.
Zelensky said Kyiv was gradually receiving “specific anti-ship systems”, the best way to break a Russian blockade of Ukrainian ports. The Kremlin said that for exports to resume from Ukrainian-held ports, Kyiv must first clear them of mines. Russia could then inspect and escort ships to international waters, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.