Russia says allied troops withdrawn from Krasny Port due to threat of siege

ANKARA

The Russian Defense Ministry on Saturday announced that "allied troops" -- the Russian army and the separatist forces in the region -- had withdrawn to "more advantageous" areas from Krasny Port in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic due to the "threat of encirclement."

Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov claimed that in a single day, Russian forces had "destroyed" over 200 military units of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in this direction.

Earlier, Kyiv had said that thousands of Russian soldiers were encircled by Ukrainian forces in the city of Lyman in the Donetsk region.

Ukrainian forces have "blocked almost all the ways of leaving and transporting ammunition to Russians," tweeted Serhiy Hayday, governor of Ukraine's Luhansk regional administration.