President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi rejected the idea of transferring part of the Ukrainian army from the east to the south, which was reported by several American media citing military experts.
He stated this following the results of the "Crimean Platform" summit.
"Does anyone understand how many people there are, how many occupiers there are in the east? Approximately 200 thousand. [...] Letʼs take our armed forces from there and transfer them somewhere. But after that, a couple of days, and [the Russians will take] Slovyansk, Kramatorsk, then they will go to Pavlograd, Dnipro, and cut off the banks. But we will not allow this, and let all the analysts of the world not even count on it," said the president.
- After the start of the counteroffensive, Western media reported that the Allies were concerned about the slow pace of the counteroffensive. In an interview with The Washington Post, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valery Zaluzhny, said that he is unhappy when he hears statements about Ukraineʼs allegedly "slow" counteroffensive. According to the commander-in-chief, "this is not a show that the whole world is watching, placing bets." Zaluzhny added that "without full support, these plans are not feasible at all, but they are being implemented."
- Later, the Pentagon said that the situation in Ukraine at the front was far from ideal, but "the Armed Forces performed a miracle by pushing the Russians to defensive positions."