Battle for Severodonetsk: The city's importance to Russia 'is more symbolic rather than strategic'

Russia claimed its forces have taken full control of residential neighbourhoods in eastern Ukraine's Severodonetsk, as President Volodymyr Zelensky vowed the "heroic defence" of the Donbas region will persist against the odds. The strategic city is currently the focus of Russia's offensive after their forces were repelled from other parts of Ukraine following the February invasion. For more analysis, FRANCE 24 is joined by Peter Zalmayev, Director of the Eurasian Democracy Initiative. As this latest brutal battle in the Luhansk region rages on, he says that the "part and parcel of Vladimir Putin's strategy, as it stands now, is to try to get this territory, to try to complete the capture of all of Luhansk, so that after over 100 days of this ridiculous war he can sell it to his people as some sort of a victory."


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