MOSCOW, February 1. /TASS/: The founder of PMC Wagner Yevgeny Prigozhin has said that Artyomovsk (Ukrainian name - Bakhmut) today is not yet in the operational encirclement of Russian forces.
"Operational encirclement implies all roads and routes of supply, evacuation and any movement are under fire control. At the moment, there is no operational encirclement of Bakhmut. For operational reasons such details are not usually reported publicly. When the city has been taken, you will certainly learn about that," said Prigozhin on the Telegram channel of his press service on Wednesday.
Fierce battles are in progress in the Artyomovsk region. Earlier, the acting head of the DPR, Denis Pushilin, reported that Russian forces were systematically cutting supply routes of the Ukrainian group in the area, using pincer movement. He also said that fighting was going on the outskirts of the city in the residential areas that had recently been held by Ukrainian units.
