Fierce battle as Russia closes in on key Ukrainian city

Russian troops are tightening their grip on the strategic eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk after advancing in a pincer movement that has nearly surrounded the area, with small Russian units reportedly entering parts of the city, according to military bloggers aligned with Moscow.

Pokrovsk, a major transport hub in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, once had a population of around 60,000 before the war forced most residents to flee. All children have been evacuated and only a handful of civilians remain. The city sits on an important supply route used by Ukrainian forces and lies close to Ukraine’s only coking coal mine, about 10 kilometers west, where mining operations were halted earlier this year by steelmaker Metinvest.

A local technical university, the region’s oldest and largest, has also been damaged by shelling and now lies abandoned.

Moscow’s goal remains the full capture of the Donbas region, which includes Donetsk and Luhansk provinces. Ukraine still holds roughly 10% of Donbas — about 5,000 square kilometers — in its western section.

Russian President Vladimir Putin insists that Donbas is legally part of Russia, though Kyiv and Western governments denounce the annexation as illegal.

READ ALSO: ‘Don’t shoot me’- Kenyan athlete begs Ukrainian troops, says he was tricked into joining Russian Army

Capturing Pokrovsk — known in Russian media as “the gateway to Donetsk” — along with the nearby city of Kostiantynivka would strengthen Moscow’s position to push north toward the last major Ukrainian-controlled cities in Donetsk: Kramatorsk and Sloviansk.

Russia has been targeting Pokrovsk for more than a year but has shifted tactics after the costly frontal assaults seen in Bakhmut. Instead, Russian forces have employed encirclement maneuvers to cut off supply lines while deploying small units and drones to disrupt Ukrainian logistics.

This approach has created what Russian military commentators describe as a “grey zone” — territory where neither side holds full control, making defense extremely difficult and costly. Clearing Pokrovsk and neighboring Myrnohrad could still take time, and Ukraine’s cross-border incursion into Russia’s Kursk region last year has also delayed Moscow’s campaign in the area.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Sunday that Kyiv’s forces are reinforcing their defenses. “There is fierce fighting in the city and on the approaches to the city… Logistics are difficult. But we must continue to destroy the occupiers,” he said.

Russia’s top general, Valery Gerasimov, told Putin that Russian troops had trapped large numbers of Ukrainian soldiers in the region. Pro-Russian bloggers claimed that Ukraine had withdrawn elite units from Pokrovsk, while the pro-Ukrainian DeepState war tracker described the situation as dire.

“The situation in Pokrovsk is on the verge of critical and continues to deteriorate to the point that it may be too late to fix,” DeepState reported.

Moscow’s military says it now controls more than 19% of Ukrainian territory, about 116,000 square kilometers. Gerasimov also reported advances near Kupiansk in Kharkiv, as well as in the Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions.

Russian progress toward Zaporizhzhia city suggests Moscow aims to seize the entire region. The Kremlin considers Crimea, Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson to be part of the Russian Federation — a claim Ukraine and most of the world reject. Only a few countries, including Syria, North Korea, and Nicaragua, recognize Moscow’s annexations.

Putin has accused Western nations of hypocrisy for supporting Kosovo’s independence from Serbia in 2008 while rejecting Russia’s claims over Crimea.

(REUTERS)