Ukrainian troops fire artillery at frontline positions near Bakhmut

Ukrainian servicemen fired M119 howitzer towards Russian positions next to the eastern city of Bakhmut on Friday (March 10). Ukraine has decided to fight on in the ruined city of Bakhmut because the battle there is pinning down Russia’s best units and degrading them ahead of a planned Ukrainian spring counter-offensive, an aide to President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said. The comments, by Mykhailo Podolyak, were the latest signal of a shift by Kyiv this week to continue the defense of the small eastern city, site of the war’s bloodiest battle as Moscow tries to secure its first victory in more than half a year. Russia has made Bakhmut the main target of a winter offensive involving hundreds of thousands of reservists and mercenaries. It has succeeded in capturing the eastern part of the city and the outskirts to the north and south, but has so far failed to close a ring around Ukrainian defenders there. Kyiv, which had seemed at the start of March to be planning to withdraw to po