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What happened in Belgorod and Bakhmut on 6 June 2023?
Summary
A retrospective on reports of a contested border village in Belgorod region and a Wagner video concerning the Bakhmut withdrawal.
What was happening along Russia's border and around Bakhmut on 6 June 2023? Reports from the previous day, 5 June, pointed to two separate security stories, both involving forces fighting on Russia's side or inside Russian territory.
Belgorod: a village under shelling
On 5 June 2023, the Russian Volunteer Corps claimed to have captured the village of Novaya Tavolzhanka in Russia's Belgorod region. The region's governor, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said about 100 civilians were still trapped in the village and could not be evacuated because shelling continued.
The claim followed a cross-border raid that began on 22 May 2023. In that raid, two Russian rebel groups based in Ukraine, the Freedom of Russia Legion and the Russian Volunteer Corps, said they had taken control of several border settlements and clashed with Russian government forces. The Polish Volunteer Corps also took part. Russian authorities described the attacks as the work of a Ukrainian "sabotage group" and imposed counter-terrorism measures in the region. The raid was the largest cross-border attack since the invasion began on 24 February 2022.
Bakhmut: a video from Wagner
Also on 5 June 2023, Wagner Group mercenaries published a video of a captured Russian commander. In it, he claimed he had ordered his troops to fire on a Wagner convoy that was leaving Bakhmut.
Taken together, the two reports showed armed fighting on the Russian side of the border, with civilians stranded in a shelled village, and a public dispute over events around Bakhmut, aired through a video released by Wagner.
