Ukraine is not 'backtracking' on counter-offensive, Zelenskyy says

Kyiv's counter-offensive has yet to yield major breakthroughs, as Russia continues to bombard port cities

Ukraine's President Volodymyr emphasised the importance of his forces acquiring long-range artillery to strengthen the counter-offensive. AP

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy projected optimism despite a stalled counter-offensive on Friday, in a last-minute speech at the annual Aspen Security Forum.

“Ukraine is not backtracking, but progressively liberates its territories,” Mr Zelenskyy said.

“Our intelligence suggests that some of our residential areas have been liberated already. So I do believe in our victory.”

Ukraine has not yet achieved a major breakthrough across Russian lines since the launch of Kyiv's counter-offensive last month.

But Ukrainian forces have recaptured some villages in the south and territory around the ruined city of Bakhmut in the east.

Kyiv claims the slow pace is deliberate to avoid high casualties.

Mr Zelenskyy emphasised the importance of his forces acquiring long-range artillery to strengthen the counter-offensive, saying that progress “depends on the lead of the US and its defence assistance”.

US Gen Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, earlier this week said the internationally backed mission “is far from a failure”.

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  As the war in Ukraine approaches the 500-day mark, 'The National' looks back at the conflict. All photos: AP

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  Ukrainian soldiers cover their ears to protect from Russian tank shelling in a shelter on the front line in the Zaporizhzhia region in July

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  A cemetery in evening sunlight near Lviv in July

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  Flooded streets in Kherson in June after the walls of the Kakhovka dam collapsed

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  Tetiana with her pets, Tsatsa and Chunya, in her house that was flooded when the Kakhovka dam in Kherson was breached

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  Young cadets sing the national anthem during a graduation ceremony at a cadet lyceum in Kyiv in June

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  Bakhmut in April, the site of the heaviest battles in the Donetsk region

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  A message on a mirror reads 'Ukraine will prevail' in a badly damaged school in Kharkiv in February

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  Ukrainian servicemen in position close to the border with Belarus in February

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  Hospital staff in Kherson with orphaned children at the regional hospital maternity ward in November 2022

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  A sniper unit aims at Russian positions in the Kherson region during an operation in November 2022

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  Ukrainian artillerymen fire at Russian positions near Bakhmut in November 2022

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  A Ukrainian serviceman near Oskil village in October 2022

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  Funeral workers carry the coffin of an unidentified civilian who died in the Bucha community during the Russian occupation period in February-March 2022

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  Cadets practise with gas masks in a bomb shelter on the first day of school at a cadet lyceum in Kyiv, Ukraine, in September

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  A young girl with her dog waves goodbye to her grandparents from an evacuation train leaving Pokrovsk in August 2022

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  A child looks up at a building destroyed during attacks in Irpin in May 2022

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  An elderly patient boards a medical evacuation train in Pokrovsk in May 2022

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  Nila Zelinska holds a doll belonging to her granddaughter that she found in her destroyed house in Potashnya, on the outskirts of Kyiv, in May 2022

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  Residents shelter in the city subway of Kharkiv in May 2022

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  Destroyed Russian tanks in Bucha, April 2022

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  A family fleeing the village of Ruska Lozova in April 2022 arrive in their shrapnel-riddled car at a screening point in Kharkiv

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  Smoke fills the air after shelling in Odesa in April

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  Yehor, 7, with a wooden toy rifle next to destroyed Russian military vehicles near Chernihiv in April 2022

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  Security Service of Ukraine servicemen enter a building during an operation to arrest suspected Russian collaborators in Kharkiv in April 2022

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  A Ukrainian soldier during a pick-up game of football in Irpin in April 2022

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  The partially abandoned town of Chernobyl in April 2022

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  Ruslan Mishanin, 36, bids farewell to his nine-year-old daughter as the train with his family leaves Odesa for Poland in April

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  Halyna Falko, 52, talks to reporters in March 2022 while looking at the destruction caused to her house near Brovary after a Russian attack

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  Anti-tank barricades on a street in preparation for a possible Russian offensive in Odesa in March 2022

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  A man recovering items from a burning shop after a Russian attack in Kharkiv in March 2022

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  Ukrainians under a destroyed bridge as they as they cross the Irpin river on the outskirts of Kyiv in March 2022

“I think that it's way too early to make that kind of call,” he said.

The Ukrainian President spoke as Moscow continues to bombard Ukrainian Black Sea port cities and after officials in Kyiv announced Russian shelling had killed a young brother and sister.

A Ukrainian official on Friday said that the two children were killed by Russian artillery in the eastern village of Druzhba.

“At about 3pm, the Russians shelled the village with artillery – one of the shells hit the yard where the children were staying – a 10-year-old boy and a 16-year-old girl,” the head of the Donetsk region military administration, Pavlo Kyrylenko, wrote on his Telegram channel.

Tension is also escalating in the Black Sea, with global implications.

Russia on Monday withdrew from a deal that had allowed the safe passage of about 33 million tonnes of food from Ukraine through the Black Sea, about half of it to developing countries.

Moscow said that any ships travelling to Ukraine's Black Sea ports will be suspected of carrying military cargo.

The warning comes after Kyiv said it was setting up a temporary shipping route to try to continue exporting grain.