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Russia says it is changing its war aims in Ukraine

Having failed to take Kyiv, Russia may focus on the east

Mandatory Credit: Photo by SERGEI ILNITSKY/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock (12868171j)Russian servicemen drive on the infantry armoured vehicles in downtown Volnovakha, Ukraine, 26 March 2022. Troops of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic with Russian support entered Volnovakha, a small town near Donetsk. Donetsk People's Republic official said that the housing stock of the city of Volnovakha was destroyed by 85 percent, the city would have to be rebuilt. On 24 February Russian troops had entered Ukrainian territory in what the Russian president declared a 'special military operation', resulting in fighting and destruction in the country, a huge flow of refugees, and multiple sanctions against Russia.Humanitarian aid for Ukrainian people in Donetsk area, Volnovakha, Ukraine - 26 Mar 2022

Editor’s note: On March 29th Russia said it would “drastically reduce combat operations” around Kyiv and Chernihiv, another northern city in Ukraine. This article has been updated as a result.

ON FEBRUARY 26TH, shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, RIA Novosti, a Russian state-run news agency, accidentally published an article that had been due to run two days into what the Kremlin thought would be a quick and easy war. “Ukraine has returned to Russia,” it boasted. “Did someone in the old European capitals, in Paris and Berlin, seriously believe that Moscow would give up Kiev?” A month into its botched campaign, Russia may be doing just that.

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