by our Eastern European Affairs correspondent As Russian forces battle for control of the streets in central Bakhmut waves of Russian rockets and drones hit Kiev and other key Ukrainian cities last week in what the Kremlin says was a reprisal for a deadly Ukrainian commando attack across the border earlier in the month. Meanwhile reports claiming that the Nord Stream pipelines were sabotaged by the Ukrainians have appeared in the American press and security forces say they’ve foiled a plot to kill the pro-Russian leader of Transnistria, a breakaway republic that lies between Moldova and Western Ukraine, that has been under Russian protection since the early 1990s. Wagner forces, Russia’s ‘foreign legion’, are fighting to root out Ukrainian troops dug in the ruins of Bakhmut with orders to delay the Russian advance for as long as possible regardless of the sacrifice. But the Ukrainian command has been blowing up bridges and pulling out their most experienced units fr...