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Sievierodonetsk withdrawal: what Kyiv announced on 24 June 2022
Summary
A look back at the day Ukraine's Luhansk governor said troops would leave Sievierodonetsk, and at the events that surrounded it.
What did it mean when Ukraine said its forces would leave Sievierodonetsk? On 24 June 2022, the Governor of Luhansk Oblast, Serhiy Haidai, announced that Ukrainian forces would withdraw from the city as Russian and pro-Russian forces advanced. The announcement came during the Battle of Sievierodonetsk, a military engagement within the wider battle of Donbas in the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
A city under pressure
The withdrawal followed a day of warnings from the same official. On 23 June 2022, Haidai said Russia was "just destroying" everything in neighbouring Lysychansk, while pro-Russian separatists said they were close to capturing both that city and Sievierodonetsk.
Further gains claimed nearby
On 24 June 2022, Ukrainian authorities said Russian forces had captured the city of Hirske, south of Lysychansk in Luhansk Oblast. Ramzan Kadyrov, the Chechen leader, said his forces had also taken the town of Zolote.
Kherson
The same day, a Russian-appointed senior official for the Kherson youth department was killed by a car bombing in Kherson, in what was described as an apparent assassination.
The days before
The 24 June announcement came after several other developments. On 23 June 2022, the European Union formally awarded official candidate status to Ukraine and Moldova. The same day, the first trial for rape during the war was set to begin in absentia against a 32-year-old Russian soldier accused of murdering a civilian and repeatedly raping his wife during the offensive in Kyiv.
On 22 June 2022, Ukrainian Air Force drone strikes hit an oil refinery in Novoshakhtinsk, in Russia's Rostov Oblast, causing a large explosion and fire, and operations at the refinery were suspended. Footage on social media appeared to show at least one armed drone striking the facility. The Ukrainian military also said it had inflicted significant losses on Russian forces with airstrikes on Snake Island in the Black Sea, destroying a Pantsir missile system, a radar station and numerous vehicles.
That day, seven Russian missiles struck Mykolaiv, killing at least one person and damaging residential and commercial buildings, according to the city's governor, Vitaliy Kim. Reporters Without Borders also released a report claiming that Russian soldiers summarily executed an injured Ukrainian photojournalist during the early stages of the conflict.
The picture on 24 June
Taken together, the reports show a front in Luhansk Oblast where Ukrainian forces were giving up Sievierodonetsk while Russian-side forces claimed ground around Lysychansk. Away from the front, strikes continued in Mykolaiv and across the border in Rostov Oblast, and a targeted killing took place in occupied Kherson.
