Intense fighting persists along the front line in Ukraine, where Russia continues to launch relentless infantry assaults and occasional mechanized attacks in an attempt to overcome defenders and achieve significant advance. The area near the city of Pokrovsk, in the eastern region of Donetsk, where a third of all clashes is recorded, remains the epicenter, together with the area near the Limitrophic region of Dnipro.
After months of pressure with few results, the situation seems to deteriorate for Ukrainian troops in Pokrovsk, although Russian advances remain gradual. Last week, several sabotage and recognition groups entered the outskirts of the city, taking advantage of a hole in the positions of the defender army. These were quickly neutralized, according to the Ukrainian high command. However, it indicates that Russia’s numerical superiority allows you to get closer and more to the city.
In particular, Russian troops They try to surround Pokrovsk from the east and northexpanding an area under its control between this city and Kostiantinivka, another medium -sized city in Donetsk.
“They are trying to move forward, while our troops try to destroy as many troops and teams, stop the offensive and repel them,” Viktor Tregubov, spokesman for the “Jorgesia” group of the Ukrainian army, said on Sunday.
According to him, the Russians avoid assaulting the city in front, since they lack the forces they had when they could sacrifice thousands of soldiers in the sieges of Mariúpol and Bajmut.
In particular, Russia tries to cut a key supply route from the town of Dobropillianorth of Pokrovsk. If he achieves it, the defending forces would also lose a vital route for a possible replication of the besieged city, according to military analysts. To do this, Russia uses attacks directed against teams of Ukrainian drone operators, using both drones and aviation.
Most Russian terrestrial attacks are carried out in small infantry groups that take advantage of trees to infiltrate the Ukrainian positions without being detected. The defensive lines on the edge of the front do not usually resemble those of large -scale wars, since both sides lack forces to maintain continuous trenches. Instead, defenders depend on small and cheap Kamikaze drones that patrol the area and eliminate enemies.
Under these conditions, it rarely makes sense that Russia sets large mechanized assaults with tanks and armored vehicles, which are usually destroyed by a combination of Ukrainian drones and artillery.
The situation near Pokrovsk is “not yet desperate” but very risky, according to the Ukrainian military analyst known as “Tatarigami.” To improve it, Ukraine would need to deploy additional forces and resources in the area, but is limited by the ongoing Russian offensive in the Sumi region and other places. The Ukrainian forces have recently made several successful counterattacks, expelling the enemy of several villages.
In a positive note, Ukraine already saved Pokrovsk once, last winter, when it seemed that the city was about to fall, through counterattacks in several vital areas. Even if Pokrovsk is captured in the coming months, it is unlikely that this means that Ukraine will lose the entire Donetsk region, where he still maintains key bastions such as Kramorsk and Sloviansk, while clinging to parts of Chasiv Yar and Toretsk, writes “Tatarigami”.
However, the gradual advances in Russia indicate a continuous tragedy for thousands of local residents, since the disputed cities and other densely populated areas are being razed.
About 100,000 people lived in Pokrovsk and Mirnogra’s satellite city before the war. Now, there are only a few thousand, refugees in basements of semi -destroyed buildings, without access to electricity, running water or regular food supplies. Some areas of the city are closed to civil volunteers trying to deliver essential assets despite vicinity fighting. The victims of daily Russian attacks are buried near nine -story or private houses.
The situation is similar in Kupiansk, in the Járkiv region. “We cannot deliver food or hygiene products to help our people,” local authorities said Sunday. Those who remain face a “daily struggle against death”, since Russia uses small drones to attack civil vehicles, according to Mayor Andri Besedin.
Russia also continues to attack large Ukrainian cities such as Odessa, Dnipro and Járkiv, as well as minor settlements located to tens or hundreds of kilometers of the front. The iconic “Privoz” market in Odesa was wrapped in flames after a recent Russian attack that killed a man and wounded four civilians. The Járkiv center was beaten by several guided air pumps and new types of drones, called “Cernika”, difficult to detect and intercept, in what Ukrainian experts describe as a test of new technologies in a densely populated city.
To counteract this, Ukraine continues to invest in the production of its own long -range drones, that have caused delays and cancellations of a hundred flights at the San Petersburg airport, since they are increasing leaders during the week.