US Official: Ukraine Likely Won't Be Able to Retake Melitopol

(Patria) - Ukrainian forces are unlikely to retake the strategically important city of Melitopol during their counteroffensive, a US official said, writes Reuters.

The Ukrainian army announced on Thursday that it had made progress on the southeastern front, breaking through from the newly liberated village of Urozhaine, in an attempt to push towards the Sea of Azov.

Melitopol has been under Russian control since March 2022, and roads and railways used by Russian troops to transport supplies to occupied areas pass through it.

Urozhaine in the Donetsk region was the first village the Kyiv government said it had retaken since July 27, signaling the challenge it faces in advancing through heavily mined Russian defensive lines without powerful air support.

The US official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, cited an intelligence report on Melitopol, but the prediction is largely consistent with Washington's stance that the counteroffensive is proceeding slower than expected. The official added that, despite the report and limited progress towards Melitopol, Washington believes it is still possible to change the grim outlook.

The assessment about Melitopol was first published by The Washington Post. White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan declined to comment but said there had been a range of analyses of the war in Ukraine since Russia's invasion in February 2022, and many of them had changed as the war unfolded.

Russia controls almost a fifth of Ukraine, including the Crimean peninsula, most of the Luhansk region, and large parts of the Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions.