Russia advances in Ukraine as Zelenskyy touts ‘mega’ US weapons deal
As tensions between Russia and Europe continue to grow, Moscow has tried to present its ground war in Ukraine as unstoppable.
The Kremlin claimed last week to be in control of two-thirds of the buildings in Kupiansk, a city in Ukraine’s northern Kharkiv region.
“Russian troops have blocked a large group of the enemy from the northern and western sides, taking it in a half-ring,” said the Ministry of Defence in Moscow.
Russia has been trying to capture Kupiansk for most of this year, believing it will unlock a northern gateway for its forces to descend to the eastern region of Donetsk, whose complete capture Moscow has prioritised.
“Taking control over Kupiansk will allow the Russian troops to advance towards the Sloviansk-Kramatorsk agglomeration,” said the Defence Ministry, referring to Ukraine’s best-fortified towns in Donetsk.
Russian officials have been saying they are on the cusp of seizing Kupiansk since March. Ukrainian military observer Konstantyn Mashovets estimated Russia needed another one to two more divisions to do so.
On September 25, Russia’s Defence Ministry also claimed to have seized 4,714 square kilometres (1,820 square miles) of Ukrainian territory this year. The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a Washington-based think tank, independently assessed the real figure to be closer to 3,434sq km (1,325sq miles).
Russia “continues to artificially inflate its claims of advance in Ukraine to support the Kremlin’s false narrative that a Russian victory in Ukraine is inevitable”, said the ISW.
Moscow’s forces, between September 25 and 29, claimed to have captured Kalinovskoye and Stepovoye in Dnipropetrovsk, and Derilovo, Mayskoye, Sandrigolovo and Kirovsk in Donetsk.
Trump’s pivot to Ukraine
On the diplomatic front, United States President Donald Trump’s remarks in New York were seen as a reversal of policy to which he has held fast during the first eight months of office.
During his first address to European allies on February 12, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told them that “returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective”.
Later that month, Trump gave Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a bruising reception at the White House. Trump has also blamed Russia’s war on Ukraine.
But on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on September 22, he praised Ukraine’s stout defence as “pretty amazing”.
He later suggested Ukraine could win a military victory.
“With time, patience, and the financial support of Europe and, in particular, NATO, the original Borders from where this War started, is very much an option,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.
As recently as August 15, when he met with President Vladimir Putin in Alaska, Trump appeared to gamble on his personal diplomacy with the Russian leader to end the war.
Trump’s apparent change of heart came as Ukraine struck Russian refineries, causing fuel shortages – a weakness in Russia’s economy to which Trump alluded.
On September 24, Ukrainian drones struck the Salavat refinery and petrochemical complex in the Bashkortostan region, 1,200km (745 miles) southeast of Moscow, for the second time in less than a week. The drones reportedly hit a distillation unit that accounts for 60 percent of the plant’s 10-million-tonne annual processing capacity.
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