‘Just Ruins’: Russian Troops Now Control About 40% of Chasiv Yar

Russian troops now control approximately 40 percent of the town of Chasiv Yar in the Donetsk region, Andriy Polukhin, a spokesperson for the 24th Separate Mechanized Brigade named after King Danylo, said Thursday, Aug. 29, speaking on the national telethon.

“At the moment, the enemy controls the part of the city near the canal, which is about 40 percent of Chasiv Yar,” Polukhin said.

Polukhin said that if the city falls, Russian troops will gain a tactical advantage due to Chasiv Yar’s elevated terrain, which overlooks the cities of Kostiantynivka, Druzhkovka, and Kramatorsk, as well as the logistical route connecting them.

Chasiv Yar, in the eastern Donetsk region, is just 10 km (6 miles) from Bakhmut, captured in May 2023 and 65 km (40 miles) from Donetsk city, which was captured at the start of the Russo-Ukrainian War in April 2014.

Before Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Chasiv Yar had a population of approximately 14,000.

The first direct assault on Chasiv Yar began in April, and heavy fighting has been ongoing since.

Polukhin reported that, as a result of the hostilities, the town has been devastated, similar to the now-ruined cities of Bakhmut and Avdiivka.

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This is what Chasiv Yar looked like at the beginning of August, as captured in a video by fighters from the 18th Brigade of the National Guard of Ukraine

“These are just ruins. The enemy does not consider these territories his own. He simply destroys everything in his path,” Polukhin said.

Russian assaults resume in Zaporizhzhia

In Zaporizhzhia region, the Donetsk region’s neighbor to the west, Russian troops resumed their assault, said Dmytro Lykhoviy, the spokesman for the Tavria Operational Group of Forces, which includes the 35th Separate Marine Brigade and the 55th Separate Artillery Brigade, on the same telethon.

According to Lykhoviy, the Russians are attempting to storm the Orikhiv district – whose city center is about 57 km (36 miles) southeast of the city of Zaporizhzhia.

There had been a two-day pause, from Aug. 22 to 24, when no Russian assaults were recorded in the entire Tavria operational zone – which includes the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.

However, Russian forces have returned to the offensive, using small infantry groups to carry out assaults, Lykhoviy said.

The General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces reported that over the past day, the Russians made two attempts to storm Ukrainian positions in the Orikhiv sector, specifically near the villages of Robotyne and Novodanylivka, to the south of Orikhiv city.

Ukrainian forces repelled both attacks, Lykhoviy said.

Earlier, Serhiy Bratchuk, the spokesman for the Odesa regional military administration, said that the Russian command had ordered its contingent in Ukraine to continue advancing in several sectors of the Zaporizhzhia region. He added that the Kremlin views this section of the front as “promising.”

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s Atesh partisan movement discovered a Russian encampment in the region. One of its agents spotted the camouflaged location of units from the 57th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade near the village of Rozivka in the northwest of the Zaporizhzhia region.

Photos published by the partisans show Russian soldiers hiding in abandoned civilian houses, camouflaged with junk.

According to the agent, up to 15 Russian servicemen are housed in one of these buildings. The abandoned buildings are also being used to shelter equipment and ammunition.

“We passed all the information to reliable hands for further action,” the partisans said.