By Ben Aris in Berlin The fall of Avdiivka has given the Russian military the initiative in the war in Ukraine, but it has also handed Russian President Vladimir Putin an important political gift ahead of the presidential elections in March. The newly appointed military commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi announced the decision to withdraw Ukrainian units from Avdiivka, an embattled city just north of Russian-occupied Donetsk in eastern Ukraine, on the night of February 17, ‘in order to avoid encirclement and preserve the lives and health of servicemen.” Drone footage of the city shows a scen…
