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Russian Forces Fully Control Bastion of Vuhledar in East Ukraine, War Bloggers Say

A satellite view of Vuhledar, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine, September 29, 2024. (2024 Planet Labs Inc./via Reuters)
A satellite view of Vuhledar, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine, September 29, 2024. (2024 Planet Labs Inc./via Reuters)
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Russian Forces Fully Control Bastion of Vuhledar in East Ukraine, War Bloggers Say

A satellite view of Vuhledar, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine, September 29, 2024. (2024 Planet Labs Inc./via Reuters)
A satellite view of Vuhledar, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine, September 29, 2024. (2024 Planet Labs Inc./via Reuters)

Russian troops have taken complete control of the eastern Ukrainian town of Vuhledar, a bastion that had resisted intense Russian attacks since the beginning of the 2022 war, Russian war bloggers and media said on Wednesday.

Russian Telegram channels published video of troops waving the Russian tricolor flag over shattered buildings. The town, which had a population of over 14,000 before the war, has been devastated, with Soviet-era apartment buildings smashed apart and scarred.

The Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper said that Vuhledar had finally fallen after the last Ukrainian forces from the 72nd Mechanized Brigade, a unit famous for its resistance, abandoned the town late on Tuesday.

The SHOT Telegram channel and pro-Russian war bloggers confirmed that Vuhledar was under total Russian control, though there was no official response from either the Russian or Ukrainian militaries.

On Tuesday, a regional Ukrainian official said Russian troops had reached the center of Vuhledar, a coal mining town located on strategic high ground.

Russian forces in eastern Ukraine have advanced at their fastest rate in two years since August, even though a Ukrainian incursion into Russia's Kursk region sought to force Moscow to divert troops.

President Vladimir Putin has said Russia's primary tactical goal is to take the whole of the Donbas region in southeastern Ukraine. Russia controls just under a fifth of the country as a whole, including about 80% of the Donbas.

Since Russia sent its army into Ukraine in February 2022, the war has largely been a story of grinding artillery and drone strikes along a heavily fortified 1,000-km (620-mile) front involving hundreds of thousands of soldiers.

BASTION FALLS

Despite the Ukrainian incursion into Kursk in early August, Russian forces have been pushing westwards at key points along some 150 km (95 miles) of the front in the Donetsk region, with the logistics hub of Pokrovsk also a key target.

They captured Ukrainsk on Sept. 17 and then encircled the hilltop town of Vuhledar, about 80 km (50 miles) south of Pokrovsk, essentially forcing Ukrainian forces to make a choice: retreat or face certain capture.

Russia has increasingly been using pincer tactics to trap and then constrict Ukrainian strongholds. Images from the area showed intense bombardment of the town with artillery and aerial glide bombs.

Neither side discloses losses. Both sides said the other paid a high human price for the town.

Control of Vuhledar, which lies at the intersection of the eastern and southern battlefields, is significant because it will ease Russia's advance as it tries to pierce deeper behind the Ukrainian defensive lines.

Russian bloggers said Russia could now try to push towards Velyka Novosilka, just over 30 km (20 miles) to the west.

Vuhledar also sits close to a railway line connecting Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014, to Ukraine's industrialized Donbas region, which comprises Donetsk and the eastern region of Luhansk.

Russian forces currently control 98.5% of the Luhansk region and 60% of the Donetsk region.

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Trump Administration Cancels Travel for Refugees Already Cleared to Resettle in the US

An Afghan refugee man, who asked not to use his name and not to show his face fearing his identity could lead to his capture, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP)
An Afghan refugee man, who asked not to use his name and not to show his face fearing his identity could lead to his capture, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP)
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Trump Administration Cancels Travel for Refugees Already Cleared to Resettle in the US

An Afghan refugee man, who asked not to use his name and not to show his face fearing his identity could lead to his capture, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP)
An Afghan refugee man, who asked not to use his name and not to show his face fearing his identity could lead to his capture, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP)

Refugees who had been approved to travel to the United States before a deadline next week suspending America's refugee resettlement program have had their travel plans canceled by the Trump administration.

Thousands of refugees who fled war and persecution and had gone through a sometimes yearslong process to start new lives in America are now stranded at various locations worldwide. That includes more than 1,600 Afghans who assisted America's war effort, as well as relatives of active-duty US military personnel.

President Donald Trump paused the refugee resettlement program this week as part of a series of executive orders cracking down on immigration. His move had left open the possibility that refugees who had been screened to come to the US and had flights booked before the Jan. 27 deadline might be able to get in under the wire.

But in an email dated Tuesday and reviewed by The Associated Press, the US agency overseeing refugee processing and arrivals told staff and stakeholders that "refugee arrivals to the United States have been suspended until further notice."

There are a little more than 10,000 refugees from around the world who had already gone through the lengthy refugee admission process and had travel scheduled over the next few weeks, according to a document obtained by the AP. It was not immediately clear how many of those had been set to arrive by upcoming deadline.

Among those are more than 1,600 Afghans cleared to come to the US as part of the program that the Biden administration set up after the American withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.

Many veterans of America's longest war have tried for years to help Afghans they worked with, in addition to their families, find refuge in the US. Many were prepared for a suspension of the resettlement program but had hoped for special consideration for the Afghans.

"The Trump administration’s early pause of refugee flights is alarming, leaving thousands of Afghan allies in fear and uncertainty," said Shawn VanDiver, a Navy veteran and head of #AfghanEvac, a coalition supporting Afghan resettlement efforts. "We are ready to partner to fix this and urge clear communication with impacted families. Let’s honor our promises and uphold America’s values."

There is a separate path — the special immigrant visa program— specifically for Afghans who worked directly with the US government. VanDiver's group said that program, set up by Congress, did not appear to be affected at this time.

Trump's order signed Monday had given the State Department a week before it began to halt all processing and traveling. It appears the timing was moved up, though it was not immediately clear what prompted the change.

The State Department referred questions to the White House.

Agencies that help refugees settle and adjust to life in America have argued that this is the type of legal immigration that Trump and his supporters say they like and have pointed to the stringent background checks and sometimes yearslong wait that refugees endure before setting foot in America.

"This abrupt halt to refugee admissions is devastating for families who have already endured unimaginable hardship and waited years for the chance to rebuild their lives in safety," Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, head of Global Refuge, one of the 10 US resettlement agencies, said in a statement Wednesday.

"Refugees go through one of the most rigorous vetting processes in the world, and many are now seeing their travel canceled just days, or even hours, before they were set to begin their new lives in the United States," she said. "It’s utterly heartbreaking."

Refugees are distinct from people who come directly to the US-Mexico border with the goal of eventually seeking asylum. Refugees must be living outside of the US to be considered for resettlement and are usually referred to the State Department by the United Nations.

While the resettlement program has historically enjoyed bipartisan support, the first Trump administration also temporarily halted resettlement and then lowered the number of refugees who could enter the country annually.