Russian forces took control of the Ukrainian city of Kreminna after “leveling everything to the ground” amid a new offensive launched in the Donbas region on Monday, officials said.

Kreminna came under artillery fire Sunday night into Monday and four civilians were killed when the Russian strikes hit their car as they fled the city, according to regional military administrator Serhiy Haidai and the Ukrainian army.

Numerous residential buildings were blasted in the attacks, along with the city’s Olympic sports complex where Ukrainian athletes train, said Haidai.

Haidai said the Russians seized the city after “leveling everything to the ground.”

Kreminna had a pre-war population of about 18,000 people and is located about 30 miles northeast of Kramatorsk in the Donbas — a region partly controlled by pro-Russia separatists since 2014.

The capture of Kreminna was part of a larger-scale attack by Russian forces on eastern Ukraine in what Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the beginning of the “battle of the Donbas.”

The Donbas, made up primarily of the Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts along Ukraine’s eastern border with Russia, has been the site of sporadic fighting since Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014.

Both Luhansk and Donbas have declared independence from Ukraine in February, which was backed by Moscow prompting the initial Russian invasion.

After Russian forces failed to take Kyiv after defenses held off a months-long siege, the Kremlin announced it was refocusing its efforts on taking the Donbas, while continuing to shell the whole of Ukraine.

“The occupiers attempted to break through our defenses,” said Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s national security council. “Fortunately, our military is holding out. They passed through only two cities — this is Kreminna and another small town.”

Moscow boasted to have destroyed 20 military targets — including ammunition depots, command headquarters and groups of troops and vehicles.  It additionally claimed that artillery hit an additional 315 targets and its warplanes conducted 108 strikes. The reports could not be verified.

“We can now say that Russian forces have started the battle of the Donbas, for which they have long prepared,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video address Monday.

With Post Wires