“Don’t worry, it’s us who are shooting,” Nataliya, a shopkeeper in Siwersk, said adamantly from behind her counter as Ukrainian artillery bombarded Russian positions about 10 kilometers away.
But the Russians do not hesitate to fire back – especially at night.
“We didn’t sleep last night,” said Nataliya, who opens her little shop when the shelling isn’t too close because “people need it.”
“It’s pretty intense,” she said. “When we come out of the cellars in the morning, you see houses burning.”
Amid artillery duels that have now been going on for weeks, Ukraine has said it has advanced east from the Donetsk region towards neighboring Lugansk.
On Monday, Sergiy Gaiday, the Ukrainian governor of the Lugansk region, announced the recapture of the village of Bilogorivka, a dozen kilometers from Siversk.
But the news has not yet been officially confirmed by the army and fighting is still going on in a narrow corridor between Russian positions, military sources in Seversk told AFP.
If the capture of Bilogorivka is confirmed, it would be a major Ukrainian base in Lugansk – until now fully controlled by Russian forces.
– ‘Nothing will stop us’ –
Back in Siwersk, Ukrainian gunners rested on their self-propelled howitzers, which they parked under a tree to take a breather.
“We shot all night. We will go and reload and then come back,” explained one of them.
They said they were shelling Russian positions around Lysychansk, a town in the Luhansk region that was captured by the Russians after a long battle in July.
A little further on, Ukrainian infantry hid in an abandoned building, keeping their heads down so as not to alert the Russians.
“We achieved our goals and did what was asked of us,” one of their commanders told AFP, without revealing those goals.
Few people walked the deserted streets between the houses destroyed by shells.
But Sergiy Medvedev brought water to five old ladies who couldn’t move and pushed the plastic containers into an old pram.
“They feed me to thank me,” he said.
Outside the small town, behind the Ukrainian lines, another group of infantry camped under trees to keep their distance from the artillery duel.
Their commander, who called himself “Valdemar”, was stubborn.
“Our forces pushed them back so much that we forced them into counter-battery fire,” he said, explaining that the Russians are now concentrating their fire on the Ukrainian guns supporting the troops in the offensive.
“From what I heard, we forced them to retreat to the Lysychansk refinery,” he added, implying that the Russians there would either have to fight with the Ukrainian army or surrender.
“The attack continues and nothing will stop us,” the officer declared, adding that his men were “ready to advance.”
