Why the fall of this city would matter to Ukraine and Russia

BBC:

Ukraine could be facing its biggest loss for months, if the key eastern city of Pokrovsk falls to Russian forces. The battle for this strategic point on a big road and rail artery in the Donetsk region has been going on for well over a year.

If Russia’s Vladimir Putin were able to claim victory there, three years and 10 months into his full-scale war, he would be a step closer to his goal of controlling Ukraine’s entire industrial east – the Donbas, made up of the neighbouring regions of Donetsk and Luhansk.

How close is Pokrovsk to falling?

Claims and counter-claims abound, so it is difficult to say.

But we do know Russia has amassed tens of thousands of troops in the area, and hundreds of its soldiers have infiltrated the city in the past few weeks, gradually taking over buildings and streets and overwhelming Ukrainian positions.

On Wednesday, Kyiv’s General Staff denied its forces in and around the town had been encircled and maintained they were still involved in “active resistance” and blocking out Russian troops. One Ukrainian regiment said it had cleared the city council and posted a video of a Ukrainian flag hung on the building.

While Ukraine’s official position is that it is holding its own against Russia, military personnel cited by a war correspondent for Ukraine’s Hromadske website said Ukrainian troops were outnumbered and more than 1,000 soldiers were at risk of becoming surrounded.

For its part Russia said it was continuing to advance northwards and thwarting attempts by Ukraine to break its troops out of encirclement. Ukrainian units were trapped in “cauldrons”, the defence ministry said, although several commentators said that was not the case.

Listen to Ukrainecast: Russia advances on Pokrovsk, Ukraine digs in, and sanctions start to bite

Open-source intelligence maps offer differing assessments of the situation on the ground. While some suggest Moscow’s troops are probably occupying large areas of Pokrovsk, others say that the majority of the town is still disputed.

“Most of Pokrovsk is no-man’s land,” the DeepState monitoring group said. “The situation is complicated and simply unclear.”