Ukraine Situation Report | 27 May 2022
The past week has seen a significant escalation of Russian military operations in the eastern Donbas region. The twin cities of Severodonetsk and Lysychansk, located on either side of the Siverskyi Donets river, have suffered extremely heavy bombardment in recent days. The mayor of Severodonetsk, Oleksandr Stryuk, said that at least 1,500 people have been killed in the city since the start of the Russian invasion and that 60 percent of residential buildings have been destroyed. He said that around 12,000 people remain trapped in the city and the options for evacuations are extremely limited. The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said that the Russians are likely to completely encircle the twin cities in the coming days. Russian-backed separatists also claim to have taken control of the city of Lyman in the Donetsk region; although this has not yet been verified, Oleksiy Arestovych, adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, appeared to concede that Lyman had fallen to pro-Russian forces.
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