Russian Troops Forced to Abandon Positions In Contested Forest, Kyiv Says

Russian forces have retreated from positions in a contested forest in eastern Ukraine's Luhansk region, Kyiv's military has said, as heavy fighting blazes on further south in the war-torn country.

Lieutenant Colonel Sviatoslav Palamar, the deputy commander of Ukraine's Azov Brigade, said on Saturday that the brigade's fighters had pushed Russian forces out of several positions in the Serebryansky Forest, close to the Moscow-controlled Luhansk city of Kreminna.

Lieutenant Colonel Nazar Voloshyn, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian forces operating in the northeast and east of the country, suggested in separate remarks that Kyiv's forces had some success close to Kreminna.

On Saturday, the Ukrainian Deep State project, which tracks Russian and Ukrainian positions along the front line, said Russian forces had retreated around Serebryansky Forest and close to Klishchiivka, a contested settlement southwest of the Russian-held Donetsk city of Bakhmut.

Newsweek has reached out to the Russian Defense Ministry for comment via email.

The forest has long been on the front lines in eastern Ukraine. In April 2024, Ukraine's military shared footage it said showed the damage inflicted on the forest by Russia's invasion. In one clip, which Kyiv said was filmed back in 2021, verdant areas of forest can be seen, followed by another video appearing to show the destruction of the territory, dated this year.

Ukraine's Azov Brigade is reported to have been fighting around the Serebryansky Forest since at least fall 2023.

Earlier this week, the U.S. State Department reversed a decision made back in 2014 to stop the Ukrainian brigade receiving American weapons, a move Azov's commander hailed as key to the unit's "effectiveness."

The Azov Brigade rose out of the volunteer Azov Battalion, with its roots in far-right and ultranationalist ideology. The fighters were on the front lines fighting pro-Moscow separatists in Ukraine from 2014; the battalion's founders were accused of having neo-Nazi sentiments.

The brigade's current members have rejected those ties, distancing themselves from the battalion's reputation since the outbreak of full-scale war in Ukraine in February 2022. The brigade is now a part of Ukraine's National Guard, and has been lauded as one of the most effective fighting forces.

The Azov Brigade said on Sunday that its troops, along with another brigade in the National Guard, had "advanced" just over a mile along the front lines during an operation back in April that had not been previously confirmed.

On Sunday, Russia's Defense Ministry said its forces had attacked Ukrainian troops, including the Azov Brigade, in several areas in the east of the country, such as a village southwest of Kreminna.

The Deep State project also said on Saturday that Russian troops had advanced south of the Serebryansky Forest, including east of the strategic Donetsk town of Pokrovsk. This section of the front line, west of the Russian-controlled city of Avdiivka, has been the site of the fiercest clashes in recent months.

Ukraine's military reported at 4 p.m. local time on Sunday that the highest number of clashes along the front line took place east of Pokrovsk.

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