This is when a Russian flag is said to have been flown over the Bakhmut administration building.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the private military organization Wagner, asserted today that his troops had ‘legally’ taken control of the 70,000-person city in east Ukraine.
“Bakhmut has been taken from a legal standpoint.”
In an audio message uploaded on his press service’s Telegram account, he claimed that the enemy was concentrating in the western regions.
Bakhmut saw fighting start in May of last year, but Russian forces didn’t make significant headway there until January and February, making it one of the longest battles of the war.
Prigozhin’s claim of victory comes despite assurances from Ukrainian officials, who dismissed the video as a stunt and said its army still holds the city.
In his nightly address, Volodymyr Zelensky indicated that fighting was continuing to heat up.
But the president gave no indication the city had fallen in the hands of Vladimir Putin’s shadow army.
Bakhmut and several other towns including Avdiivka were at the ‘epicentre of hostilities’, a statement from Ukraine’ military said last night.
‘The enemy continues its assault Bakhmut. But our defenders courageously hold the city,’ it said.
Zelensky thanked soldiers fighting in Avdiivka, Maryinka, and Bakhmut. ‘Especially Bakhmut. It is especially hot there,’ he stressed.
Ukrainian deputy defence minister Hanna Maliar had previously described the situation in the city as ‘tense’.
She said Ukrainian forces were defending their positions, while Russia’s were paying scant attention to losses as they attacked.
Ukrainian military analyst Oleh Zhdanov said fighting had engulfed the centre of Bakhmut.
Ukrainian forces had repelled 25 enemy attacks, but enemy troops had captured the AZOM metal plant.
‘The enemy is attacking the city centre from the north, the east and the south and is trying to take the city under its full control,’ Zhdanov, who has close ties to the Ukrainian military, said in a video on YouTube.