'Ukrainians have reported that the Russian soldiers were quick to retreat'
Visit our website:
http://www.france24.com
Like us on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English
Follow us on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/France24_en
Transcript
00:00 "The claims are yet to be verified, but according to Kiev, Starojeve is the fourth town to be
00:14 liberated from Russian forces in the past few days."
00:18 "At first, the enemy resisted, but we managed to take the initiative and slowly, house by
00:27 house, we recaptured the town."
00:32 Reuters news agency was able to verify the location of the footage filmed by the Ukrainian
00:37 armed forces as Starojeve, but could not confirm the data was shot.
00:42 Along with Blahodatny, Neskuchny and Makaryvka, the four towns in the eastern Donetsk region
00:47 are relatively small, but their liberation would back theories that Ukraine wants to
00:52 rupture the land bridge between Russian-occupied Crimea and Donetsk.
00:57 The military is under strict orders of operational silence, but Ukrainian soldiers have reported
01:03 that the Russians were quick to retreat.
01:06 "They fled, threw everything, now there is such a mess, it's just a mess."
01:14 But Moscow was yet to confirm any retreats.
01:17 The Russian defence ministry has painted Ukraine's counter-offensive as a failure since it began
01:22 last week.
01:24 It claims to have repelled all attacks and says it has destroyed several American and
01:28 German-made armoured vehicles.