Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Mariinka under heavy fire
Key Developments on March 24:
Colonel Oleksii Dmytrashkivskyi, a spokesman for Ukraine’s military defending southern Donetsk Oblast, said Avdiivka is one of the main hotspots of the ongoing Russian offensive.
“The enemy continues to attack Avdiivka and try to encircle it,” Dmytrashkivskyi said. “Moreover, fighting is taking place near Mariinka, the enemy is trying to attack us there.”
Mariinka and Avdiivka are adjacent to the Russian-occupied regional capital of Donetsk, 40 kilometers south of Bakhmut.
In its regular evening report, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces reported that the Moscow Armed Forces are concentrating their main efforts on the eastern Donetsk region, including Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Mariinka.
The General Staff said Russian troops were still storming Bakhmut, but it remained under Ukrainian control.
A day earlier, General Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of the Ukrainian Ground Forces, called Ukrainian forces in Bakhmut are preparing to “exploit” the massive casualties and exhaustion of Russian forces.
This was also reported by the British Ministry of Defense in its secret service To update that there is a “realistic possibility” that Russia will lose momentum in Bakhmut.
civilian fatalities
On March 24, Russian attacks on Ukraine resulted in at least 10 civilians killed and 20 wounded, according to authorities.
At least two people were killed and nine wounded during the night of March 24 in a Russian attack on the town of Bilopilia in northern Sumy Oblast. after to the military administration of the Sumy region.
Five people were killed when a Russian missile hit an “invincibility center” in Kostyantynivka in eastern Donetsk Oblast. Three of the victims were internally displaced persons, including one who fled Bakhmut.
“Invincibility Centers” are humanitarian support centers set up across Ukraine after the start of Russian mass missile attacks targeting energy infrastructure in the fall of 2022.
They allow local residents to charge their phones, connect to the internet, warm up and rest.
Two people were killed in Avdiivka in Donetsk Oblast, Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said. He added that another four people were injured in the oblast in the past 24 hours.
One person died in the attack on the border areas of Chernihiv Oblast, Ukraine’s northern operations command reported.
Ukraine retrieves the bodies of 83 soldiers killed in combat
Ukraine has repatriated the bodies of 83 soldiers killed in combat, the Reintegration Ministry reported March 24.
The Office of the Commissioner for Missing Persons and Ukrainian law enforcement agencies organized the transfer of the remains of soldiers from the occupied territories.
The Reintegration Ministry said in its March 3 update that a total of 1,426 fallen Ukrainian soldiers had been returned to their families for proper burial.