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Russia widens its stated war aims in Ukraine
Summary
A retrospective on 21 July 2022, the day after Moscow's foreign minister extended Russia's declared goals beyond the Donbas.
What did it mean when Russia's stated goals in Ukraine grew larger? On 21 July 2022, the question followed a statement made the day before, on 20 July 2022, by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. He said his country's military aims were no longer limited to the Donbas region and now also covered the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, along with a number of other territories.
A shift in the declared aims
The statement came shortly after Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu ordered the military to expand operations in Ukraine, a step presented as a way to protect the Donbas. On 16 July 2022, Russian missiles struck Chuhuiv in Kharkiv Oblast, killing three civilians and injuring three others. More than 50 Grad rockets hit Nikopol in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, killing two people.
Administration in the occupied south
The naming of Zaporizhzhia alongside Kherson fitted a pattern already visible on the ground. On 18 July 2022, Russia announced Anton Koltsov, a former Prime Minister of Vologda Oblast, as the new Prime Minister in the Zaporizhzhia Military-Civilian Administration. The appointment probably took place some days earlier.
The Zaporizhzhia region also featured in a separate charge. On 16 July 2022, the president of Energoatom, Ukraine's nuclear energy authority, accused Russian forces of using the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant to store weapons and to shell the surrounding area.
Pressure inside Kyiv
Ukraine was dealing with its own security concerns. On 18 July 2022, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova and Ivan Bakanov, the top security official of the Security Service of Ukraine. More than 60 officials from those agencies were alleged to be working with Russia, and 651 cases of alleged treason and collaboration were initiated against prosecutorial and law enforcement officials.
Reading the day
Taken together, the reports from those days show a war whose declared geography was widening, with strikes on cities outside the Donbas, new Russian-installed administrative arrangements in Zaporizhzhia, and a shake-up of Ukraine's top law enforcement ranks. Lavrov's remarks put into words a scope that the military orders and the appointments in the south had already pointed towards.
