LUGANSK, December 13. /TASS/. Ukrainian troops are ignoring orders to launch attacks near the city of Artyomovsk (called Bakhmut in Ukraine), Andrey Marochko, an officer with the Lugansk People’s Republic’s (LPR) People’s Militia, told TASS on Tuesday.

According to him, Ukrainian troops stationed in the Artyomovsk area "are massively ignoring the orders of their commanding officers."

"In particular, drivers from an armor group got all the fuel out of their vehicles to make it impossible to launch an offensive. Meanwhile, a joint assault team consisting of mercenaries, Ukrainian service members and mobilized soldiers failed to reach a meeting point, took shelter in a forest and reported to the command that their vehicles had got stuck on the road due to the bad weather," Marochko said, citing intelligence.

He added that senior Ukrainian army officers were blaming their failures and huge troop losses on unfavorable weather conditions.

Marochko said earlier that the Ukrainian military was losing a battalion of soldiers killed and wounded in the Artyomovsk area every day.