he chief of Vladimir Putin’s Wagner Group “private army” accused Russian soldiers on Monday of “quietly running away” permitting Ukrainian forces to retake a part of a village close to Bakhmut within the nation’s east.

Yevgeny Prigozhin was scathing in his criticism of Russian troops for dropping floor at Berkhivka, north of the city which has seen a few of the fiercest combating in Europe for the reason that Second World War.

Western officers estimate Wagner and Russian forces suffered some 60,000 casualties within the year-long battle for Bakhmut, with roughly a 3rd of them being fatalities as troops have been “mown” down in waves of First World War-type assaults.

Prigozhin’s non-public Wagner militia captured Bakhmut final month after the longest battle of the battle and handed its positions there to common Russian troops.

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Ukrainian forces have continued to assault areas north and south of town together with Berkhivka, whose seizure Wagner had claimed on February 24.

The village lies about two miles northwest of Bakhmut.

“Now part of the settlement of Berkhivka has already been lost, the troops are quietly running away. Disgrace!” Prigozhin mentioned in an audio message printed by his press service.

He urged Russia’s Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and the nation’s Chief of the General Staff, Valery Gerasimov, to return to the entrance to rally the troops.

His outburst got here amid studies that Wagner troopers had captured a lieutenant colonel of the Russian army, accusing him of firing on them and forcing him to do a hostage-type admission.

Prigozhin has waged an astonishing public feud with Shoigu and Gerasimov for months, incessantly accusing them of failing to offer ample ammunition and assist for Wagner within the discipline, and so inflicting it to endure needlessly heavy losses

Denis Pushilin, the Moscow-backed governor of the Donetsk area, which incorporates Bakhmut, informed Russian state tv the scenario in town’s flanks was “under control” however “very difficult”.