KYIV, Ukraine — With arms nonetheless grimy from the battlefield, a dozen Russian prisoners of warfare sat, stony-faced, in a convention room of a Ukrainian information company on Saturday and described being captured after their armored columns had been ambushed.
Lt. Dmitry Kovalensky, who had fought in a Russian tank unit and spoke on the behest of his Ukrainian captors, mentioned he lately got here underneath fireplace from an armed drone and shoulder-launched anti-tank missiles on a highway close to Sumy, in northeastern Ukraine. “The entire column burned,” he mentioned.
Round the similar time and a couple of miles away, at a makeshift Ukrainian army base in an deserted construction at the western fringe of Kyiv, Ukrainian squaddies ready for a similar type of ambushes that took out Lieutenant Kovalensky’s unit.
Lt. Yevgeny Yarantsev, a Ukrainian officer, mentioned his nation’s squaddies combat another way than the Russians. The troops underneath his command prepare in small, nimble gadgets that may sneak up on and ambush the lumbering columns of Russian tanks.
“They have got a large number of tanks, we’ve got a large number of anti-tank guns,” mentioned Lieutenant Yarantsev, who up to now fought with a volunteer team towards Russia in jap Ukraine. “Within the open box, it’ll be even. It’s more straightforward to combat within the town.”
The 2 younger officials — the similar rank, however every representing a distinct nation — gave one of the crucial few firsthand accounts of the preventing that experience emerged within the 10-day warfare. The Russian used to be a prisoner of warfare talking underneath the watchful eye of closely armed Ukrainian safety officers. The Ukrainian spoke as he displayed newly received, subtle guns from the USA.
The accounts of squaddies from each side give a small glimpse of how the warfare is being fought round Kyiv within the north. There, depending in large part on ambush techniques, Ukrainian forces have slowed the Russian marketing campaign to encircle and seize the capital, whilst Russian troops barrel around the south.
Lieutenant Kovalensky and the opposite Russian prisoners had been offered at a information convention meant to improve Ukraine’s declare that it had captured an important selection of Russian squaddies. Of their statements, the prisoners combined woodenly phrased condemnations of their very own nation’s management with genuine-sounding main points of the war’s early firefights.
In step with the foundations governing remedy of prisoners of warfare underneath the Geneva Conventions, governments are intended to give protection to a prisoner of warfare from being made right into a “public interest,” an idea this is occasionally interpreted as no longer presenting them in any public surroundings. The Russian squaddies appeared exhausted, however confirmed no outward indicators of getting been mistreated.
The prisoners’ feedback and the reality in their seize supported descriptions by way of Western army analysts and governments of a Russian offensive that has suffered grave setbacks. The Russian military’s awesome numbers and gear, alternatively, may neatly opposite that pattern.
“Close to the top of the day’s motion on Feb. 27, our column used to be attacked,” Pvt. Dmitry Gagarin of the Russian military instructed the journalists. “My commander burned and died. I bumped into the woodland and later surrendered to native other people.”
Lieutenant Kovalensky mentioned he realized Russia would invade Ukraine simplest the night prior to the tank columns started shifting, and that squaddies on the rank of sergeant and decrease weren’t instructed the place they had been using till after crossing the border.
The entire prisoners described being captured after their armored columns had been ambushed on roads, accounts that supported Ukraine’s assertions that its army had made excellent use of Western-supplied anti-tank weaponry, such because the American-made Javelin missile. However impartial analysts have additionally described extra mundane issues for the Russian military, together with logistical snarls and a loss of gasoline.
Lieutenant Yarantsev, the Ukrainian officer, instructions what he described as a cell team of about 500 squaddies who’re skirmishing with the Russians at the western option to Kyiv. He mentioned that their potentialities had been reinforced 3 days in the past once they gained Barrett 50-caliber sniper rifles in a cargo from the USA.
Swish and black, with barrels see you later they give the impression of being virtually like spears, the rifles had been being unpacked and inspected. One sniper, who declined to supply his identify, mentioned he had fired one in fight at the outskirts of Kyiv.
Lieutenant Yarantsev mentioned the troops had been extra comfy having the ability to garrison in structures than in fields or forests. “I’ve spotted one thing about warfare,” he mentioned. “Infantrymen need to be someplace the place cell phones paintings and the place there’s web.”
The construction the warriors have taken up in, in a leafy residential house of town, used to be cluttered with ammunition containers. Two hand grenades sat at the ground beside a settee. The warriors had an electrical kettle and presented espresso. In a hallway, a soldier oiled his Kalashnikov.
The preventing has been inching nearer to the capital. Ukraine’s protection minister, Oleksii Reznikov, mentioned in a observation on Saturday that the Russian forces’ number one function is to encircle Kyiv, following the strategy they’ve pursued with smaller towns akin to Mariupol at the Sea of Azov, which is now surrounded, with its warmth and electrical energy bring to a halt.
The preventing round Kyiv is most commonly in Irpin and Bucha, two outlying cities to the northwest, the place stipulations are grim. A central side road in Bucha is now clogged with the blistered husks of Russian armored workforce carriers, destroyed in an ambush.
Stanislav Bobrytsky, a pc programmer reached by way of telephone in Irpin, mentioned he had no longer left his condominium since Tuesday. “The entire home windows are shaking” from blasts, he mentioned. “It’s very frightening.”
Within the heart of Kyiv, on the information convention with captured Russian squaddies, the Ukrainian safety officers provide refused to talk. A moderator handed round a microphone, providing journalists a chance to query the prisoners.
Lieutenant Kovalensky mentioned he used to be interesting to the Russian other people to get up and overthrow President Vladimir V. Putin since the Russian management had deceived the military’s officials concerning the objectives of the warfare and had used the guise of an army workout to arrange for an invasion.
The prisoners mentioned they didn’t know what would occur to them after the scoop convention. Whilst they mentioned they had been handled neatly, days after their seize it used to be unclear if that they had showered or been presented blank garments.
Maria Varenikova contributed reporting from Lviv, Ukraine.
