Putin ‘still wants to capture most of Ukraine’, US warns

The struggle in Ukraine will seemingly grind on for months to come back, intelligence say (Image: AFP)

Vladimir Putin nonetheless has plans to seize ‘most of Ukraine’ regardless of enormous losses by Russian troops.

US intelligence businesses consider the Kremlin chief plans to make sluggish, however persistent, features of territory.

Low morale and mounting deaths have weakened Moscow’s fighters, however the scenario on the bottom remains to be ‘very grim’.

In accordance with Avril Haines, director of Nationwide Intelligence, the struggle in Ukraine may linger for a very long time.

Whereas Putin refocused his efforts on the Donbas area in March and April, she says his authentic goals nonetheless stay.

However the 69-year-old will unlikely obtain his objectives anytime quickly, she added.

Ms Haines instructed a US Commerce Division Convention: ‘We understand a disconnect between Putin’s near-term army aims on this space and his army’s capability, a type of mismatch between his ambitions and what the army is ready to accomplish.

She added the invasion would proceed ‘for an prolonged time frame’ and that on the bottom in Ukraine ‘the image stays fairly grim.’

Avril Haines says Vladimir Putin’s authentic objectives stay the identical because the struggle rages on (Image: AP)

Russia just lately focused and destroyed a shopping center within the metropolis of Kremenchuk (Image: AP)

The speech marked her first public feedback by the intelligence chief since Could.

Whereas Putin’s intention stay the identical as they did in the beginning of the battle, she added that Russia was nonetheless solely making ‘incremental features, with no breakthrough’.

Troops have been making their manner by way of the Donbas area, just lately taking management of the town of Severodonetsk.

However progress has been sluggish within the face of Ukrainian resistance.

Vladimir Putin has a ‘mismatch’ between his goals and actuality, Ms Haines says (Image: Getty Photographs)

The aftermath of a rocket assault on the Mashhidropryvid plant in Ukraine (Image: Getty Photographs)

Ms Haines’ feedback got here after a withdrawal of Russian troops from Snake Island, off the coast of Ukraine.

The island, which Russia occupied on the primary day of its invasion, achieved worldwide fame when border guards stationed there rejected calls to give up.

Footage had confirmed the Ukrainian troopers telling sailors aboard the Moskva warship to ‘go f**ok your self’ over a loudspeaker.

Russia at this time stated it has withdrawn from Snake Island off Ukraine’s Black Beach in what it calls a ‘gesture of goodwill’.

The nation’s defence ministry claimed the transfer reveals Moscow is just not impeding United Nations efforts to organise a humanitarian hall to export Ukrainian agricultural merchandise.

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