Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of Wagner’s mercenary group, said on Sunday that fierce fighting is ongoing in the northern part of the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, Reuters reports.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the “Wagner” PMC, said that his soldiers are “fighting for every street, every house, every entrance” against the Ukrainian forces, who are not retreating.

Russian forces have been trying to surround and capture Bakhmut, a town in eastern Donbas, for weeks and appear to be making slow, difficult and expensive progress.

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi has repeatedly stated in recent days that the situation around the city is difficult.

“No one will refuse Bakhmut. We will fight as long as we can. We consider Bakhmut our fortress,” he said on Friday.

Britain’s Ministry of Defense said on Sunday that Russia had made “some progress” in its efforts to surround Bakhmut.

Ukrainians “fight to the last”

If Russian forces succeed in capturing the city, which has been devastated by artillery fire for months, it will be their most important strategic advance since last summer, when an initial offensive through eastern Ukraine stalled and was eventually reversed by a series of stunning Ukrainian counterattacks. – attacks in the second half of 2022.

Prigozhin denied the information of the Russian mass media that the Ukrainian troops had left Bakhmut.

“Ukrainian forces are not retreating anywhere. Fight to the last,” he wrote in his Telegram channel.

“In the northern regions, there are fierce battles for every street, every house, every entrance,” he added.

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