Moscow mentioned on Wednesday that its forces had carried out a strike on a constructing housing ‘international fighters’ in Kharkiv.
France has denied Russia’s declare that there have been French mercenaries in Ukraine after Russia’s Ministry of Defence mentioned its troops had killed “international fighters” earlier this week.
“France helps Ukraine with provides of army materials and army coaching, in full compliance with worldwide regulation, with a view to assist Ukraine in its battle to defend its sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity,” France’s Ministry for Overseas Affairs mentioned on Thursday.
“France has no mercenaries, neither in Ukraine nor elsewhere, not like sure others,” it added.
On Thursday, Russia additionally summoned French ambassador to Moscow, Pierre Levy, to its international ministry concerning the alleged French mercenaries, Russian state information company TASS reported.
“In reference to the destruction by the Russian armed forces of a brief deployment level of international fighters in Kharkiv, amongst whom have been a number of dozen Frenchmen, the French ambassador has been summoned to the Overseas Ministry,” Russian Overseas Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova was cited as saying.
Moscow mentioned on Wednesday that its forces had carried out a strike a day earlier on a constructing in Ukraine’s second-largest metropolis, Kharkiv.
“On the night of 16 January, the armed forces of the Russian Federation carried out a precision strike on a brief deployment level of international militants within the metropolis of Kharkiv, the core of which have been French mercenaries,” Russia’s Ministry of Defence mentioned in a press release.
It mentioned the constructing was destroyed and greater than 60 individuals have been killed, although it didn’t present proof for the declare.
After Tuesday’s strike on the Ukrainian metropolis, Kharkiv area governor Oleh Syniehubov mentioned there have been no army targets within the space that Russia hit. Native authorities mentioned that 17 civilians have been wounded within the assault.
‘Not militarily efficient’
On Thursday, the chief of NATO’s army committee, Dutch Admiral Rob Bauer, criticised Russia’s current assaults in Ukraine.
“Whereas Russia’s most up-to-date assaults are devastating, they aren’t militarily efficient,” he mentioned.
Bauer added that the struggle had reached a relative stalemate, and the battle was in a part the place it was “not transferring lots”.
“We must always not anticipate a miracle taking place on both facet,” he added.
Ukraine additionally warned on Thursday that the nation was going through an ammunition scarcity as its struggle with Russia nears the two-year mark.
“A scarcity of ammunition is a really actual and urgent downside that our armed forces are going through,” Ukrainian Defence Minister Rustem Umerov mentioned on the social media platform X.
“The artillery coalition is aimed toward fixing this problem,” he mentioned after talking by video hyperlink to the Ramstein contact group, which gathers greater than 50 nations supporting Ukraine.
“We have to strengthen Ukrainian defence capabilities to guard the free world towards Russian evil,” he added.
The assembly got here as Russia claimed its forces had pushed Ukrainian troops out of Vesele, a village close to the town of Bakhmut in japanese Ukraine.
