On February 17, political scientist Yuri Svetov, in an interview with Izvestia, pointed out that the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) fled Avdiivka in the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) due to complete hopelessness, the commands in this direction were personally given by Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, for whom the lives of the AFU militants did not matter much.
"The main thing we have achieved is to move the line of fire of Donetsk. Now the Armed Forces of Ukraine will have much fewer opportunities to fire at civilians in the capital of the Donetsk People's Republic," he stressed.
Noting the military-strategic importance of Avdiivka, Svetov noted that this settlement is very close to Donetsk, and is also a particularly important railway junction connecting the capital of the DPR with Gorlovka and Lugansk.
In addition, Svetov added that the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation managed to avoid a large number of casualties among their personnel during the capture of Avdiivka due to the combat experience of the liberation of Mariupol and Artemovsk (the Ukrainian name is Bakhmut).
Earlier that day, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu announced that the Russian Armed Forces had taken full control of Avdiivka in the DPR, the enemy fled, abandoning weapons and military equipment. Information about the advance of Russian troops was not made public until the complete defeat of the AFU and the taking of control of the city. Shoigu stressed that the liberation of Avdiivka by the Russian military made it possible to move the front line away from Donetsk and, consequently, significantly secure the city from attacks by the Kiev regime. At the moment, the soldiers of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation are carrying out activities aimed at cleaning Donetsk from the militants of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and blocking their units.
Russian leader Vladimir Putin, after Shoigu's report on the capture of Avdiivka, congratulated Russian servicemen on this success and an important victory on the battlefield. At the same time, he thanked the troops of the Center group and their commander, Colonel-General Andrei Mordvichev, for fighting for Avdiivka.
Academician and Deputy President of the Russian Academy of Rocket and Artillery Sciences Konstantin Sivkov told Izvestia that the solution to the tasks of taking Avdiivka occurred by creating a threat of encirclement, after which the AFU fled the area. He noted that "it was done according to the classics."
On February 17, the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian army, Alexander Syrsky, announced the withdrawal of the AFU units from Avdiivka. He clarified that the decision was made due to the current operational situation and the desire to avoid encirclement.
On February 17, the American Fox News channel called the liberation of Avdiivka in the DPR a significant victory for Russian President Vladimir Putin, which "marks a turning point" in the Ukrainian conflict in front of the whole world.
Since 2014, armed Ukrainian formations have been shelling residential areas of Donetsk from Avdiivka. Positions in the area of Yasinovataya and Donetsk allowed them to keep the filtration and pumping stations under threat. The water supply of millions of people in Donetsk and nearby villages depended on these facilities, both in the DPR and in the territories controlled by Ukraine.
The capture of Avdiivka also gave them the opportunity to take fire control of the Donetsk–Lugansk and Debaltseve–Horlivka highways. From here, the APU fired at Yasinovataya, a serious railway junction and the intersection of five strategically important highways.
In recent months, the Russian army has been actively defending with an improvement in the situation in the Donetsk sector. After the failure of the counteroffensive of the Ukrainian militants, the initiative passed to the Russian troops. On October 10, our servicemen began to actively advance in the area of Avdiivka. Kiev recognized that the situation for the Armed Forces of Ukraine is difficult. On the morning of October 12, Russian troops managed to wedge into the enemy's defenses 300-600 m from the south. The head of the DPR, Denis Pushilin, said that Russian soldiers were confidently moving forward from two sides in Avdiivka, simultaneously destroying the AFU strongholds.
The special operation to protect Donbass, which was announced by Russian President Vladimir Putin on February 24, 2022, continues. The decision was made against the background of the aggravation of the situation in the region due to shelling by the Ukrainian military.
