Give us more military equipment, more weapons, and we will deal with the Russian occupier, we will destroy them,” said Dmytro, a serviceman standing in the snow near Bakhmut, echoing a plea by his president to the Munich conference.
Nearly one year into the invasion, President Vladimir Putin’s troops are intensifying assaults in the east.
Ukraine is planning a spring counter-offensive, for which it wants more, heavier and longer-range weapons from its western allies.
Europe’s worst conflict since World War II has killed tens of thousands of people, uprooted millions from their homes, pummelled the global economy and made Putin a pariah in the west.
He says he is fighting for Russia’s security against an aggressively expanding Nato alliance, but Kyiv and its allies cast the invasion as a colonial-style land grab in Ukraine, formerly part of the Russian-dominated Soviet Union.
On the freezing battlefield, Ukrainian servicemen showed a visiting journalist the benefits of Australian-provided Bushmaster armoured vehicles in an area where Russian soldiers have become bogged down in months of fighting to take Bakhmut, which Russia’s Wagner mercenary group is attacking.
The vehicles shield soldiers from bullets, enable evacuations of wounded and give cover for reconnaissance, Dmytro added.
“There were cases when anti-tank mines were detonated, and the soldiers only received contusions. There were no serious injuries to the soldiers. It has worked very well.”
The governor of Luhansk, one of two provinces in what is known as the Donbas, which Russia partially controls and wants to take completely, said ground and air attacks were increasing.
“Today it is rather difficult on all directions,” Serhiy Haidai told local TV. “There are constant attempts to break through our defence lines,” he said of fighting near the city of Kreminna. In its latest update, Russia said a barrage of missile strikes on Thursday around Ukraine had achieved their goals in hitting facilities providing fuel and ammunition to Ukrianian president Volodymyr Zelensky’s army.
Kyiv reported 36 missiles, of which 16 were shot down, and said its largest oil refinery, Kremenchuk, was struck.
Attending the three-day Munich Security Conference were a host of senior western officials including German chancellor Olaf Scholz, French president Emmanuel Macron and US vice-president Kamala Harris.
At last year’s gathering, they had urged Putin not to invade and warned of dire consequences if he did.
This year, they are grappling with the implications of that.
Mr Zelensky, speaking by video link, called for allies at the meeting to speed up sending weapons and won immediate support from Chancellor Scholz and President Macron.
In another sign of international backing, the International Monetary Fund said yesterday it had reached an agreement with Ukraine, paving the way for talks on a full loan programme.
As well as the pressing problem of the war, the Cold War-style standoff with Russia has revived huge wider security issues for Europe: how much to rely on the US, how much to spend on defence and how to build its own capacity.
Kyiv said only a full Russian exit was acceptable.
“Negotiations can begin when Russia withdraws its troops from the territory of Ukraine. Other options only give Russia time to regroup forces and resume hostilities at any moment,” presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak wrote on Twitter.
Moscow accuses the United States of inciting Ukraine to escalate the war and now being directly involved.
“The American warmongers ... supply weapons in huge quantities, provide intelligence and participate directly in the planning of combat operations,” said Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for the Russian foreign ministry.
Russia’s current focus is on Bakhmut, a now largely shattered city in Donetsk province whose pre-war population of about 70,000 people have mainly fled.