Soledar Situation Unclear as Wagner Group's Claims of Control in Dispute

Fierce battles for the small salt-mining city of Soledar in eastern Ukraine between Russian and Ukrainian forces are reportedly still ongoing despite a claim by the Wagner Group that it had seized the territory, located near embattled city of Bakhmut.

Hanna Maliar, deputy head of Ukraine's defense ministry, said in a statement on Telegram that Russia is losing a significant portion of its troops in clashes.

"Heavy fighting for the city of Soledar is ongoing in Donetsk Oblast. Russians continue to actively storm the city despite huge losses of personnel," Maliar said. "Approaches to our positions are covered with the bodies of Russian soldiers. Only a very strong nation can fight so desperately with such a powerful enemy."

Maliar said Ukrainian forces continue to hold the line courageously.

The Wagner Group, founded by Russian billionaire Yevgeny Prigozhin in 2014, meanwhile claimed to have taken control of Soledar, but said pockets of Ukrainian resistance were holding out in the center.

"Wagner units took control of the entire territory of Soledar... No units other than Wagner PMC fighters were involved in the storming of Soledar," Prigozhin said in an audio message published by his business, Concord.

Prigozhin said Soledar was a "cauldron" of urban fighting.

Russia's defense ministry said Wednesday its Airborne Forces units had blocked the city from the north and south.

"The Russian Aerospace Forces are striking at enemy strongholds. Assault detachments are fighting in the city," Igor Konashenkov, a spokesman for the department, told reporters.

Ukraine's military has denied the Wagner Group's claims that it had captured Soledar.

"The town is not under the control of the Russian Federation. There are fierce battles going on now," Serhiy Cherevatyi, spokesperson for the eastern military command, told Ukrainian television. "There is a complicated situation there."

Cherevatyi said the military command was "working now on how to stabilize the situation with the maximum impact for the enemy and minimum losses for Ukraine."

"The intensity of battles near Bakhmut can be compared with World War II," Cherevatyi added, noting that Russian forces are using a lot of Soviet-era weapons and armored vehicles with some modernized elements in the conflict.

"Our partners are providing us with more modern weapons," he said.

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a U.S. think tank, separately assessed on Tuesday that Russian forces have not captured the entirety of Soledar despite Russian claims that the city has fallen and that Bakhmut risks imminent encirclement.

Prigozhin said on his Telegram channel over the weekend that mines in Bakhmut and Soledar would benefit Russia's campaign in the war.

"The system of Soledar and Bakhmut mines, which is actually a network of underground cities, can not only [hold] a big group of people at a depth of 80-100 meters, but also tanks and infantry fighting vehicles, which can move about there," he wrote, referring to the network of salt mines, caves and 125 miles of tunnels.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his nightly video address on Monday night that "there is almost no life left" in Soledar.

"Everything is completely destroyed...and thousands of their people are lost: the whole land near Soledar is in the corpses of the invaders and scarred from the blows. This is what insanity looks like," he said.

Newsweek has reached out to the Russian foreign ministry for comment.

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