January 10, 2023 Russia-Ukraine news

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A Ukrainian serviceman administers first aid to a wounded soldier at a shelter in Soledar on January 8.

A Ukrainian soldier fighting in the eastern town of Soledar told CNN that the situation is “critical” and the death toll is now so high that “no one counts the dead”.?

The soldier is from the 46th air mobile brigade, which is leading Ukraine’s fight to hold onto Soledar in the face of a massive assault from Russian troops and Wagner mercenaries.

CNN is not identifying him for security reasons.?

He described a dynamic battlefield where buildings change hands daily and units can’t keep track of the escalating death toll. “No one will tell you how many dead and wounded there are. Because no one knows for sure. Not a single person,” he said. “Not at the headquarters. Not anywhere. Positions are being taken and re-taken constantly. What was our house today, becomes Wagner’s the next day.”

“In Soledar, no one counts the dead,” he added.

The soldier said it was unclear as of Tuesday night how much of the town was held by the Russians: “No one can definitely say who moved where and who holds what, because no one knows for sure. There is a huge grey area in the city that everyone claims to control, [but] it’s just any empty hype.”

The Ukrainians have lost many troops in Soledar but the ranks are being replenished as the fight for the mining town continues, he said: “The personnel of our units have been renewed by almost half, more or less. We do not even have time to memorize each other’s call signs [when new personnel arrive].”

The soldier said that he believed Ukraine’s military leaders would eventually abandon the fight for Soledar and questioned why they hadn’t done this yet. “Everyone understands that the city will be abandoned. Everyone understands this,” he said. “I just want to understand what the point [in fighting house to house] is. Why die, if we are going to leave it anyway today or tomorrow?”

The 46th air mobile brigade said on its Telegram channel on Tuesday that the situation in Soledar was “very difficult, but manageable.”?

In his nightly address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked the soldiers of the brigade “for their bravery and steadfastness in defending Soledar.”

Smoke rises from Soledar, Ukraine, after shelling on January 8.

The fierce battle for control of the eastern town of Soledar in Ukraine is intensifying. Meanwhile, Ukrainian soldiers are set to begin training soon on the Patriot missile system in the US.

Here are some of the latest developments in Russia’s war in Ukraine:

The fight for Soledar: Russian troops are focusing attention on Soledar — a salt mining town in eastern Ukraine. According to spokesperson Serhii Cherevatyi of the Eastern Group of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Russian troops have fired 86 times at the area over the past day. Still, Cherevatyi insisted the situation in the town is “under control” and that in some other places near Bakhmut, “the enemy has even been driven back.”

Resources for Ukraine: The Pentagon confirmed the US will begin training 90 to 100 Ukrainian soldiers on the Patriot missile system as soon as next week at Fort Sill in Oklahoma. The US is providing one Patriot battery, which includes power generating equipment, computers, an engagement control system and up to eight launchers. The battery is operated by roughly 90 soldiers and takes months to train up on.

Meanwhile, Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock on Tuesday made a surprise trip to the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv and confirmed that Berlin had promised to send more weapons to the country, according to a statement. Air Force Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder did not have any details Tuesday about how Germany intended to handle training on the Patriot system it committed to sending Ukraine and whether Berlin would wait for training to complete on the US system before sending its own.

Russian army appointment: Russian?Col. Gen.?Aleksandr Lapin, who?previously was head of Central Military District,?has been appointed chief of the General Staff of the Ground Forces of the Russian army, the Russian state?news agency?TASS reported on Tuesday, referring to?unnamed?sources close to the military department.?Lapin’s appointment took place at the end of 2022, another source told TASS.

CNN was unable to independently verify this report.?

Human rights concerns: A Russian government consultative body established to protect “human rights and freedoms” has been reviewing?doctors’ complaints about sending cured soldiers back to the frontlines without proper rehabilitation,?Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported on Tuesday. Work is already underway to resolve the issue,?council member?Olga Demicheva?told RIA Novosti.?

A Russian government consultative body established to protect “human rights and freedoms” has been reviewing?doctors’ complaints about sending cured soldiers back to the frontlines without proper rehabilitation,?Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported on Tuesday.

A member of the Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights,?established to assist the Russian president “in the exercise of his constitutional responsibilities to guarantee and protect human rights and freedoms,” told RIA Novosti that there have been cases, in which soldiers, who had not fully recovered from injuries, have been sent back to the frontlines to fight.?

“As a result, the treatments they received simply go down the drain, and instead of healthy people, we could get people with disabilities,” she said.

According to Demicheva, the council has received two appeals from the staff at medical institutions in Donetsk and Moscow.

Work is already underway to resolve the issue,?Demicheva?told RIA Novosti.?

Chris Parry is one of two British men who have gone missing in Ukraine.

The family of a British man who has gone missing in Ukraine have expressed concern on Tuesday about his health and whereabouts in a statement released by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office.?

“We are very worried and concerned about the health and whereabouts of Chris right now,” according to the statement issued on behalf of Chris Parry, one of the men missing in Ukraine.?

“We, his family and partner, all love him very much and would be grateful if our privacy could be respected at this difficult time,” it added.

The UK Foreign Office confirmed to CNN on Monday they were supporting the families of two British men who have gone missing in Ukraine.

The Foreign Office did not provide any further comment about?the two nationals or their last known location.??

Ukraine’s security service says an official in the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) has been indicted after an investigation, alleging that they found he was “publicly justifying Russia’s armed aggression against Ukraine.”?

It did not name the accused.

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said it had searched the home and church premises of the metropolitan of one of the Church’s dioceses in the central Vinnytsia region and found “pro-Kremlin propaganda leaflets and literature”.?

The suspect will now stand trial on four charges and faces up to eight years in prison, the SBU’s statement said.?

More context: The UOC was previously subordinate to the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church.?In May?last year, its leaders announced they were breaking ties with Moscow after Patriarch Kirill gave his support to the war.

CNN has?previously reported?that the SBU had carried out searches of premises belonging to the UOC in several regions?as part of an effort to counter suspected “subversive activities of (the) Russian special services.”

A Patriot missile system seen at Poland’s Rzeszow Airport last year.

The Pentagon confirmed that the US will begin training 90 to 100 Ukrainian soldiers on the Patriot missile system as soon as next week at Fort Sill in Oklahoma.?

CNN was first to report?that the training would begin on US soil and it will last “several months.”

“Once fielded, the Patriot… will contribute to Ukraine’s air defense capabilities, and provide another capability to the Ukrainian people to defend themselves against Russia’s ongoing aerial assaults,” said Pentagon press secretary Air Force Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder at a press briefing.

Ryder also confirmed that the previously announced combined arms training program for Ukrainian battalions in Europe will also begin as early as next week and “will not require a significant or any increase in terms of US trainers” deploying to Europe.

Ryder did not have any details about how Germany intended to handle training on the Patriot system it committed to sending Ukraine and whether Berlin would wait for training to complete on the US system before sending its own.

More background: The US announced it was?sending Ukraine the Patriot missile system?in late December when the country’s President Volodomyr Zelensky visited Washington, DC, and met with President Joe Biden.

The US is providing one Patriot battery, which includes power generating equipment, computers, an engagement control system and up to eight launchers. The battery is operated by roughly 90 soldiers and takes months to train up on.

Though the Patriot is broadly seen as one of the most advanced and effective air defense systems,?experts cautioned?that it is “not a game-changer” because of its limited range and the amount of time it will take for Ukrainians to be able to utilize it.

CNN’s Haley Britzky contributed reporting to this post.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and Ukraine's Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, visit a destroyed boiler system in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on January 10.

Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock made a surprise trip to the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on Tuesday and confirmed that Berlin had promised to send more weapons to the country, according to a statement on the ministry’s website.

Ukrainians “should know that they can rely on our solidarity and support,” she said.

This comes after Germany’s ambassador to the US?had said?Thursday that Berlin would provide Ukraine with Marder infantry fighting vehicles and an additional Patriot air defense battery.?

“I have no doubts further German military aid will come,” tweeted Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba who accompanied Baerbock to Kharkiv.

Baerbock also spoke about Ukraine’s long-term goal of joining the European Union.?

The Ukrainians, “see their future in Europe, in the EU,” she said. “That is why I would also like to talk about the progress made in the accession process. As the Federal Government, we want to make very concrete offers to Ukraine in order to make progress in strengthening the rule of law, independent institutions and the fight against corruption, as well as in aligning with EU standards.”

Russian?Col. Gen.?Aleksandr Lapin, who?previously was head of Central Military District,?has been appointed chief of the General Staff of the Ground Forces of the Russian army, the Russian state?news agency?TASS reported on Tuesday, referring to?unnamed?sources close to the military department.?

Lapin’s appointment took place at the end of 2022, another source told TASS.

CNN was unable to independently verify this report. There were no official state announcements about the appointment, and Kremlin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov?also declined to confirm on Tuesday.

Military analyst?Ian?Matveev?characterized?Lapin’s promotion as “more of a bureaucratic position, and not a military one.”

Lapin, despite having received the Hero of Russia?medal,?was heavily?criticized?by?the head of the Chechen Republic and Putin’s trusted ally, Ramzan Kadyrov,?and Yevgeny Prigozhin, whose Wagner group of private military contractors are involved in fighting in the east of Ukraine.?Lapin was branded “talentless” by both, following the retreat of Russian forces from the strategic eastern city of Lyman, in the Donetsk region.

Ukrainian servicemen administer first aid to a wounded soldier in a shelter in Soledar in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, on January 8.

The intense fight for the salt mining town of Soledar in Ukraine’s east has seen Russian forces fire 86 times at the area over the past day, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian armed forces in eastern Ukraine has told CNN.

Cherevatyi denied a claim by?the head of the Russian-backed Donetsk People’s Republic, Denis Pushilin, that the Kremlin’s forces were close to taking Soledar. Pushilin had been quoted by Russian state news agency TASS as telling on Channel 1 on Tuesday that the town was “close to liberation,” without offering any evidence for his claim.

Cherevatyi said: “We have no such information at the moment. They [the Russians] often make similar statements in similar situations when there are intense battles… they have not been able to take anything solid [in the east], even the district center of Bakhmut, for six months. So now they are trying to inflate another super-victory around Soledar.”

Cherevatyi insisted the situation in the town is “under control” and that in some other places near Bakhmut, “the enemy has even been driven back.”

Ukrainians are set to begin training on the Patriot missile system in the United States as soon as next week, two US officials familiar with the matter tell CNN.?

The training program will take place at Fort Sill in Oklahoma, where the US conducts its own training on operating and maintaining the advanced air defense system. Fort Sill is one of the Army’s four basic training locations and home to the service’s field artillery school, which has been training service members for more than a century.?

The training for the Ukrainians on the complex system is expected to take “several months,” said Laura Cooper, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia. “I’m not going to be able to give you a specific timeframe for the completion of the training.”

This comes after Pentagon press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said Thursday that the US was looking at a variety of options for where to conduct the Patriot missile training “to include potential training here in the US, overseas, or a combination of both.”

The US announced it was sending Ukraine the Patriot missile system in late December when Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky visited Washington and met with US President Joe Biden.

Germany recently announced that it was sending Ukraine a second Patriot missile system from its own inventory.

Men walk amid debris of a destroyed building purported to be a vocational college used as temporary accommodation for Russian soldiers in?Makiivka?in Russian-controlled Ukraine, on January 10.

Lists of Russian soldiers killed in the attack on Makiivka on Jan. 1 will not be published, a military commissioner said Tuesday, according to Russian state media RIA Novosti.

The Russian Ministry of Defense earlier reported 89 Russian servicemen were killed as a result of a Ukrainian strike on Russian-occupied Makiivka on New Year’s Day. The Ukrainian military reported higher figures, initially claiming up to around 400 Russian soldiers were killed.?

CNN cannot independently verify either side’s reported death toll, but the strike appears to be one of the deadliest episodes of the conflict for Moscow’s forces since they invaded the country.?

Fighting has ramped up in eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine, as the fierce battle for control of the mining town of Soledar intensifies.

Here are the latest developments:

NATO's Secretary General?Jens?Stoltenberg, President of the European Council Charles Michel and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen pose following the signing of a joint declaration of cooperation between the EU and NATO in Brussels, Belgium, on January 10.

NATO has pledged to “strengthen” support for Ukraine after signing a joint declaration with the European Union on Tuesday.?

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg called the “strategic partnership” between the EU and NATO “more important than ever,” as Russia’s grinding invasion of Ukraine approaches 11 months.

“We must continue to strengthen the partnership between NATO and the European Union, and we must further strengthen our support to Ukraine,” Stoltenberg said in Brussels, after signing the third joint EU-NATO declaration with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Charles Michel.?

The EU-NATO partnership will become?“even more important once Finland and Sweden become full NATO members with their accession,” von der Leyen added. ?

The European Commission chief referenced the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines as an example of the need “to take more responsibility for the security of our network infrastructure.”?

She also highlighted the importance of keeping?“the pressure on the Kremlin,” saying that the EU will soon impose sanctions on countries including Belarus and Iran who militarily support Russia’s war in Ukraine.

NATO has remained steadfast in its support of Ukraine since Russian launched its invasion in February, with Western allies sending billions of dollars worth of weapons and other aid to Kyiv.

Challenging weather conditions are exacerbating the stress on Ukrainian power systems, the country’s state energy agency has said.

It comes after relentless Russian strikes ravaged the country’s power grid late last year.

“Electricity consumption in Ukraine has increased due to low temperatures exacerbated by strong winds in most regions,” Ukrenergo said Tuesday.

Supply limits in many regions have already been “exceeded,” so emergency outages are now in place, the company said.

High wind gusts had caused “damages to distribution system operators” and repairs were underway, the company added.

Some context: Moscow has repeatedly targeted Ukraine’s energy infrastructure and left many residents without access to heat and power.

Amnesty International previously said Russia strikes on critical systems were “unlawful” and amounted to “a war crime.”

“Russia’s targeting of Ukrainian civilian infrastructure is unlawful. The morale of the civilian population is not a lawful target, and carrying out these attacks with the sole purpose of terrorizing civilians is a war crime,” Marie Struthers, Amnesty International’s director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, said in a statement in October.

“All those responsible for ordering and committing these criminal attacks must be held to account. With Russia ramping up its efforts to terrorize civilians in Ukraine, the international community must urgently respond and condemn these heinous attacks.”

A view shows remains of MLRS?shells?used by?Russian?troops for military strikes of the city and collected by sappers in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on November 29.

As Russia’s?invasion of Ukraine?enters its 11th month, US and Ukrainian officials tell CNN that Russia’s artillery fire is down dramatically from its wartime high, in some places by as much as 75%.

US and Ukrainian officials don’t yet have a clear or singular explanation. Russia may be rationing artillery rounds due to low supplies, or it could be part of a broader reassessment of tactics in the face of successful Ukrainian offenses.

It also comes as Ukraine is enjoying increased military support from its Western allies, with the US and Germany announcing last week that they will be providing Ukrainian forces for the first time with?armored fighting vehicles, as well as another Patriot Defense missile battery that will help protect its skies.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, meanwhile, is apparently clambering to shore up domestic political support, US intelligence officials believe, for a war he initially would only describe as a limited “special military operation.”

Read the full story:

Destroyed Russian armored car standing by the railway line seen from the window of an evacuation train from Kherson to Khmelnytskyi, on Sunday, December 18, 2022.

Related article Russian artillery fire down nearly 75%, US officials say, in latest sign of struggles for Moscow | CNN Politics

Italy must sort out “technical issues” before dispatching air defense systems to Kyiv, according to the country’s foreign minister.

Antonio Tajani told Italian radio station Rai Radio 1 that the Italian government was not slowing down its aid to Ukraine, but he did not specify what the issues with the air defense systems were.

On December 27, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni told him during a phone call that Italy was considering sending air defenses to Ukraine.

“The defense project is Italian-French, we are working intensively with the French, there are technical problems to resolve with regards to non-bureaucratic military aspects,” Tajani told Rai on Tuesday.??

“There are no brakes on the air defense project in Ukraine,” the foreign minister said, adding that the country’s defense minister?Guido Crosetto was also working on the problem.?

A sailor is on duty in the control room of the Admiral Gorshkov frigate in this handout photo taken from video released by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on January 10.

One of Russia’s most modern warships armed with advanced hypersonic missiles held exercises in the Norwegian Sea, Russia’s defense ministry said on Tuesday.?

The?frigate Admiral Gorshkov conducted air defense exercises, practicing the repelling of enemy air strikes in difficult weather conditions at sea, the ministry said in a statement.?

The crew practiced maneuvering the ship, transmitting and receiving target assignment data and the deployment of onboard weapons, the ministry added.

Last Wednesday, the warship set off from a northern Russian port after Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke with the ship’s commander and defense minister Sergei Shoigu via video link, TASS news agency reported.

Putin boasted that the ship was carrying Zircon hypersonic missiles, long-range weapons that travel more than five times the speed of sound and are harder to detect and intercept.

At the time, the conflict in Ukraine was not mentioned specifically in the TASS report. Whether the Zircon missile could be deployed in that war is uncertain.

CNN’s Brad Lendon contributed reporting.

NATO Secretary General?Jens?Stoltenberg?speaks during NHO's (Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise) annual conference in Oslo Spektrum, Norway, on January 5.

The Kremlin has said the US and NATO are indirectly taking part in the “conflict” in Ukraine, as Russia’s grinding invasion approaches 11 months.

Peskov was echoing an earlier statement made by Russian Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev, who said Monday that Russia is fighting with NATO in Ukraine.

Russia “is liberating its regions from occupation and must put an end to the bloody experiment of the West to destroy the fraternal Ukrainian people,” Patrushev added.

“We are not at war with Ukraine, because by definition we cannot have hatred towards ordinary Ukrainians,” he said.

“The sooner the citizens of Ukraine realize that the West is fighting against Russia with their hands, the more lives will be saved,” Patrushev added. “The whole story with Ukraine was started in Washington in order to work out the technologies for delimiting and playing off united people against each other.”

Some context: NATO has remained steadfast in supporting Ukraine’s resistance against Russia, with Western nations sending billions of dollars worth of weapons and other aid to Kyiv.

On Thursday, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg warned of the danger of underestimating Russia during President Vladimir Putin’s “war of aggression against Ukraine.”

“The Ukrainian forces have inflicted heavy losses on Russia in Ukraine. But Russians have once again shown a willingness to take great risks and endure great human losses,” Stoltenberg said at a business conference in Oslo, Norway.

Smoke rises after shelling in Soledar in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, on January 8.

The head of Russian private military company Wagner has said Kyiv is defending Soledar with “honor,” as the fierce battle for control of the mining town in eastern Ukraine intensifies.

Yevgeny Prigozhin posted on Telegram that “the hardest, bloodiest battles are being fought” for control of Soledar, which has seen some of the heaviest fighting along the front line in Ukraine in recent days.

Wagner forces are “exclusively” working to capture Soledar, Prigozhin said over the weekend, describing the mines underneath Soledar and Bakhmut as a “network of underground cities.”

Soledar is located 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) north of Bakhmut in the greater Donetsk region, which has been held by Russian-backed separatists since 2014 and is one of four Ukrainian regions that Moscow claims as Russian territory in violation of international law.

The move for Soledar by Wagner would be strategically important to the ultimate capture of Bakhmut, as a way of enveloping the city from the north and disrupting Ukrainian communication lines.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky previously said Russian forces were focusing their manpower on capturing Soledar.

“Thousands of their people have been lost: The whole ground near Soledar is covered with the corpses of the occupiers and scars from the blows. This is how madness looks like,” Zelensky added.

Tatiana Moskalkova during a ceremony in Moscow on January 29, 2019.

Russia’s?human rights commissioner Tatiana Moskalkova said she plans to meet with her Ukrainian counterpart in Turkey later this week, Russian state media reported Tuesday.

She added that the conference would take place January 12-14.

Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets?wrote on Telegram Sunday that a meeting with?Moskalkova?would “take place in a few days in Turkey.”

“The main issue to be discussed is the return of our heroes home,” he said, adding that plans were “ambitious.”

“Separately, we will raise the issue of the return of civilian hostages who were massively detained by the Russian Federation in the temporarily occupied territories and are not allowed to return home.”

The planned meeting comes after Kyiv and Moscow?carried out a prisoner exchange?Sunday with a total of 100 soldiers returning to their home countries, according to officials in both nations.

Volodymyr Zelensky addresses the US Congress in Washington, DC on December 21, 2022.

Russia is focused on capturing the mining town of Soledar in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his nightly address on Monday.?

The Russians, “have concentrated their greatest efforts on Soledar,” he said. “It is extremely difficult — there are almost no undamaged walls left.”?

Ukrainian troops have repelled a previous Russian attempt to capture the town, Zelensky’s deputy defense minister said?earlier Monday. Zelensky said his men’s “resilience” had “won additional time” for Ukraine.?

Zelensky said his administration was working to get the military equipment promised by Ukraine’s allies to the front line as soon as possible: “We are doing everything to ensure that there is as little time as possible between the agreement on additional support and the application of this support on the battlefield.”?

Two British nationals have gone missing in Ukraine, the UK’s?Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said in a statement to CNN Monday.??

The spokesperson didn’t provide further details about the two British nationals or their last known location.??

Russian troops are making another attempt to advance on the small town of Soledar near Bakhmut in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar said on Telegram Monday.

“After an unsuccessful [previous] attempt to capture Soledar and retreat, the enemy regrouped, restored losses, deployed additional assault units, changed tactics and launched a powerful assault,” Maliar said.

“At the moment, the enemy has engaged a large number of assault groups formed from the best reserves of the Wagner’s troops. The enemy is advancing literally on the corpses of their own soldiers, massively using artillery, multiple rocket launchers and mortars, covering even their own fighters with fire.”

Earlier on Monday, Serhii Cherevatyi, a Ukrainian military spokesperson, told Ukrainian TV that Russia had “managed to concentrate more of its units” around Soledar and was deploying both “regular” troops and mercenaries working for the private sector group Wagner there.

The head of the Wagner group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said Sunday that one of the reasons he wanted to take over Bakhmut and Soledar in order to control the system of mines in that area, which he described as “a network of underground cities.”

Cherevatyi, spokesperson for Eastern Group of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, said they were trying to evacuate civilians from Soledar but not everyone was willing to leave.

On Sunday night, President Volodymr?Zelensky said?Soledar was “holding out” but it was “extremely hard.”

Plumes of smoke rise from a Russian strike in Bakhmut on January 7.

Russian forces claimed to have taken the village of?Bakhmuts’ke?in the Donetsk region on Monday, according to a statement published by the headquarters of the Territorial?Defense?of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) on its Telegram channel.?

The village of?Bakhmuts’ke?is located near?Soledar?and?Bakhmut?— the area?which has been the site of intense fighting for months.?

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday called?Bakhmut?and?Soledar?“one of the bloodiest places on the frontline.”?

CNN has not been able to independently confirm DPR’s claims.?

The shelter was jammed with people on the eve of Orthodox Christmas.

Some were trying to warm up around the wood stove after traveling in the freezing drizzle. Others lined up for a cup of hot coffee and biscuits. Under the Christmas tree lay a tangle of wires charging mobile phones.

There has been no electricity, running water or cell phone service in Bakhmut, in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region, for months.

This shelter, with a generator, a wireless router connected to a satellite link up, offers hot food and drinks, medicine, and equally important, volunteers with a sympathetic ear. It’s an oasis of comfort in a frigid landscape of danger, destruction and deprivation. Roughly 40 to 50 people were there when CNN visited.

Tetyana Scherbak, a volunteer in a bright green high visibility vest, hustled about that Friday, stopping to speak to an elderly woman hunched over in front of the stove, coaxing a chuckle from another.

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