A Ukrainian soldier based in Kyiv has told Newstalk that he and his comrades expect the Russians will launch a second wave attack on their city within days and are preparing accordingly. 

Until a few weeks ago Andriy Parkhomenko was a family man living an ordinary life in Dublin. However, after war broke out he felt compelled to return to the land of his birth and is currently serving in a territorial defence unit in the capital. 

On Friday, Moscow said that Russian Forces had achieved their “main objectives” and would now focus “on achieving the main goal, the liberation of Donbass.”

A captured Russian soldier is questioned by Ukrainian Soldiers. Refugees flee Irpin, and Ukrainian forces continue to fortify the city, as Russian forces attempt to advance on the Ukrainian capital city of Kyiv on March 5th, 2022 in Irpin, Ukraine. (Photo by Justin Yau/ Credit: Sipa USA/Alamy Live News

However, British intelligence believe that “Russia will continue to use its heavy firepower on urban areas as it looks to limit its own already considerable losses”; it is a prediction that Mr Parkhomenko believes will come true:  

“The expectation for the next days or weeks [is that] the city could be under heavy shelling and airstrikes,” Mr Parkhomenko told The Anton Savage Show. 

“We still face it daily and almost every hour… but it’s been disrupted… So we expect that more heavy shelling [will happen] in the next several days. 

“We suspect that several ground forces are now getting prepared to join Russians in a full scale attack on the north of Ukraine because this month the Russians did not advance much and our forces have counterattacked successfully.

“So Kyiv now has a kind of more [protection] to prevent ground forces from bombing the city. Now we are facing mainly airstrikes and rocket launches.”

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Equipment making the difference

Some 150,000 Russian soldiers, many of whom are teenage conscripts, have been deployed and last week US intelligence announced that they believe at least 7,000 of them have died, while a further 21,000 are estimated to have been injured.

NATO countries, such as Britain and the United States have donated large amounts of military equipment and Mr Parkhomenko says it is making a real difference: 

“Most regular forces are well-equipped,” he described. 

“And now [equipment] is being delivered to territorial defence forces and we are getting more and better equipped daily.”

Main image: Ukrainian Army Ground Forces soldiers following a live-fire training exercise at Central City Camp, International Peacekeeping and Security Center October 29, 2015 near Yavoriv, Ukraine. Picture by: Alamy.com