According to Siberian journalist Yevgenia Baltatarova, who is currently based in Kazakhstan, 36-year-old Major Mikhail Zhilin managed to send his wife and children to Kazakhstan after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a partial mobilization in September to beef-up his armed forces as they suffered setbacks from the strong resistance being put up by Ukraine's military.He asked for political asylum, but his request was rejected by Kazakh authorities and he was arrested, Baltatarova added in a Telegram post on December 8.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said Russian forces have turned Bakhmut into "ruins" in their continued attempt to encircle the strategic city in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk region, while the Ukrainian military has said it has thwarted the latest attacks in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.In his nightly video address to the nation on December 10, Zelenskiy said the situation "remains very difficult" in several frontline cities in the two partially occupied regions that together make up the Donbas region.In fighting elsewhere in Ukraine, Russian state media reported the occupied southeastern city of Melitopol, in the Zaporizhzhya region, came under missile attack by Ukrainian forces on the evening of December 10."