LONDON (Reuters) – The founding father of Russia’s most high-profile mercenary group said on Saturday he wanted his forces and the regular Russian army to capture the small city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine since it possessed “underground cities” that may hold troops and tanks.
Russia’s grinding greater than five months-long push to attempt to take Bakhmut has puzzled some Western military analysts who’ve said that heavy losses incurred on the Russian side and the indisputable fact that Ukraine has built defensive lines to fall back to nearby mean any Russian victory there, if it happens, can be pyrrhic.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, founding father of Russia’s Wagner mercenary group which is fighting within the battle of Bakhmut, set out intimately on Saturday why he thought its capture can be significant.
“The cherry on the cake is the system of Soledar and Bakhmut mines, which is definitely a network of underground cities. It not only (has the flexibility to carry) a giant group of individuals at a depth of 80-100 metres, but tanks and infantry fighting vehicles can even move about.”
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Prigozhin, who would likely see his political capital in Moscow boosted if Bakhmut fell to Russia given Wagner’s role within the fighting there, said stockpiles of weapons had been stored within the underground complexes since World War One.
His comments were a reference to vast salt and other mines in the realm which contain greater than 100 miles of tunnels and an enormous underground room which has hosted football matches and classical music live shows in additional peaceful times.
A White House official said on Thursday that Washington believed Prigozhin desired to take control of salt and gypsum mines in the realm for business reasons. It made no mention of their alleged subterranean military use.
Prigozhin, who’s sanctioned within the West, cited other benefits of taking Bakhmut, calling it “a serious logistics centre” with unique defensive fortifications.
He made his comments on his press service’s Telegram channel as shellfire echoed around Bakhmut’s near-deserted streets on Saturday despite a self-declared Russian ceasefire to mark Orthodox Christmas, something Kyiv rejected as a ploy.
Bakhmut, which Russia calls Artyomovsk, is the main focus of essentially the most intense fighting in Ukraine, and Prigozhin made his comments as one other Telegram channel related to Wagner claimed Russia had captured a strategically-important settlement on Bakhmut’s outskirts.
Reuters couldn’t independently confirm the assertion.
The Russian defence ministry earlier on Saturday reported fierce fighting in eastern Ukraine.
A Ukrainian defence ministry spokesman said the town of Soledar, which is near Bakhmut and hosts a salt mine, was still under Ukrainian control despite what he described as fierce Russian assaults.
(Reporting by Andrew Osborn; Editing by Christina Fincher)
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