KEY POINTS
- A video shared on Telegram showed a Ukrainian soldier celebrating the island’s liberation
- Russian forces were reportedly driven out of the island before New Year’s Day
- The UAF General Staff has not yet confirmed the liberation of the island in Kherson Oblast
Ukraine has successfully liberated the island of Velykyi Potomkin in Kherson Oblast from the Russian occupation, according to a report.
In a video shared on Telegram by Oleksii Honcharenko, a parliamentarian of the European Solidarity party, a Ukrainian soldier was seen celebrating the liberation of the island while standing beside a Ukrainian flag.
In the Telegram post, Honrachenko wrote that Ukrainian forces liberated the island, which is located between the left and right banks of the Dnipro River.
Sources among Ukrainian forces in the south told digital news outlet Ukrainska Pravda that the Russians were driven out of the island before New Year’s Day.
However, the Armed Forces of Ukraine (UAF) General Staff has yet to confirm the claims. The last time the UAF General Staff reported progress on the island was on Dec. 15. At the time, the General Staff accused the Russian army of forcibly evacuating the island’s Ukrainian citizens to temporarily occupied territories.
Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24 with the aim of “demilitarizing” and “de-Nazifying” the country. In the early months of the invasion, Russian forces captured large swaths of territories, particularly areas in the regions of Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk, Luhansk and Mariupol.
Ukrainian forces, however, reclaimed a number of key cities and nearly 1,900 settlements from Russian troops. This included the city of Kherson, which is the only Ukrainian regional capital that the Russian army successfully captured throughout the war.
Ukraine’s successful counteroffensive operations could mean the liberation of all its territories, apart from the Crimean Peninsula, by the end of 2023, former military intelligence officer Philip Ingram told Sky News.
“If their next counteroffensive is as successful as the two they have done already – and I see no reason why it shouldn’t be – there’s definitely a strong possibility that they have recaptured all the territory in mainland Ukraine by the end of the year,” Ingram said, adding, “So I think 2023 will be a year of further Ukrainian counteroffensives and successes.”
It is unclear where Ukraine’s counteroffensive operations will occur next. However, a Forbes report published in December claimed there were signs that Ukrainian forces may be preparing for the fourth counteroffensive in Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
