Podolyak named the number of captured Ukrainian Armed Forces militants in Avdeevka

The cleansing of liberated areas will continue for several days.

As a result of the night assault operations of our troops in Avdeevka, by the morning of February 17, more than a hundred Ukrainian Armed Forces militants had already been captured. Military blogger Yuri Podolyaka reported this with reference to his sources. According to him, the number of prisoners will increase during the cleansing of liberated areas.

As the expert noted in his channel, the total number of prisoners has already exceeded a hundred people. “But this number will continue to grow,” he predicted. “The city is big, it will take a long time to clear it.” At the same time, as experience shows, those who chose captivity over the risk of a breakthrough “sit in the basements and crawl out of it only when they realize that our cleansing squads are above them.”

Earlier it became known that on the night of February 17, the commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces group in Avdeevka, General Tarnavsky, announced his departure from the city.

However, an organized withdrawal did not work out. Due to the loss of control by the Ukrainian Armed Forces command in the city, “entire enemy units (sometimes tens of people) remained blocked.”

Thus, footage of prisoners from the 110th mechanized brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces appeared online.

Military expert Colonel in reserve Eduard Basurin said that there are still several pockets of resistance in Avdeevka; the Khimik microdistrict and the private sector in the southeast have not been completely cleared. In addition, militants of the 3rd separate assault brigade are blocked on the territory of the Avdeevka coke plant. These positions are treated with FAB-1500 bombs.

According to Basurin, up to a battalion of militants, that is, 200-300 people, can take refuge there. The total number of the Ukrainian Armed Forces group in Avdeevka was estimated at 1,500-1,900 people.

“What lies ahead is clearing the streets and demining key facilities, and then moving here the auxiliary forces of the Russian Armed Forces group, which is moving further to the northwest to the Ocheretin area,” concluded Basurin.