Surrender To Save Yourselves, Russia Urges Ukrainian Troops Squeezed In Key City

KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian troops person launched chopper raids and counteroffensives to effort and easiness nan unit connected a cardinal eastbound city, as nan Kremlin seeks a important battlefield triumph pinch the U.S. push for bid shelved.

Street battles were being fought successful Pokrovsk, a carrier and proviso hub whose seizure could service arsenic a springboard for nan Russian subject to frighten bigger adjacent cities. It would besides manus Vladimir Putin caller leverage astatine a delicate negotiated moment, pinch nan Russian leader group connected capturing nan entirety of nan broader Donetsk region.

Putin's forces person been battling to return Pokrovsk for much than a year, but now look connected nan verge of a breakthrough pinch nan beforehand lines successful nan metropolis progressively blurred.

The Russian Defense Ministry said Wednesday that Ukrainian troops should surrender to prevention themselves, claiming they were "trapped" by Russian forces successful nan city, which was erstwhile location to immoderate 60,000 group but is now mostly deserted and destroyed.

It said that Russian troops were advancing further northward into Pokrovsk, blocking aggregate Ukrainian attempts to break retired of encirclement.

Ukraine has rejected nan thought that its troops were encircled. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited troops Tuesday successful adjacent Dobropillia, wherever Ukrainian forces are staging a counteroffensive to effort and tie Russia’s focus.

Zelenskyy has insisted that Russian forces had not achieved “any success” successful Pokrovsk successful caller days.Ukraine Presidency / ZUMA Press via Shutterstock

NBC News could not independently verify nan battlefield accounts from either side.

However, Ukrainian subject officials and soldiers connected nan crushed person conceded that nan business successful Pokrovsk is progressively challenging.

“The business is difficult,” Sgt. Liana Kononchuk of nan Ukrainian portion operating successful Pokrovsk, told NBC News via WhatsApp this week. “We are trying to power it. But, unfortunately, it has only been getting worse lately,” nan 31-year-old said.

“As of now location is nary imperishable statement of defense arsenic such,” she said. “The force seeps northwards by one, two, 3 units astatine a time, thereby trying to erode nan frontline,” Kononchuk added.

Her comments lucifer nan appraisal of nan Ukrainian open-source mapping task Deep State. Its latest representation showed that Russian forces had pushed further into nan metropolis from nan southbound but that astir of nan area remained a contested grey area controlled by neither side.

Ukraine has deployed further resources successful a bid to clasp backmost nan Russian assault, including a typical forces cognition utilizing U.S.-made Black Hawk helicopters to reconstruct proviso routes, according to a spokesperson for nan 7th Rapid Response Corps that is starring nan protect effort.

A still taken from a video said by a Ukrainian subject root to show a chopper and troops deployed successful nan eastbound metropolis of Pokrovsk, Ukraine. Ukrainian Military root / via Reuters

Kononchuk hopes that these reinforcements will stabilize nan situation. “The logistics business is now very complicated. Rotating positions is hard, and evacuating nan wounded is moreover harder,” she said.

The Ukrainian commandant overseeing defense of nan city, Col. Yevhen Lasiichuk, said via WhatsApp connected Monday that Moscow’s claims of an encirclement were mendacious and portion of Russia’s propaganda “game.”

Lasiichuk said that location were betwixt 200 and 300 Russian soldiers wrong nan city.

“They are trying to push done nan municipality to artifact cardinal logistic points,” he added.

Lasiichuk stressed that, though complicated, Ukraine was still capable to scope its troops successful Pokrovsk.

“Our Defense Forces units person precocious carried retired airborne landings,” he said. “This surely does not look for illustration an encirclement.”

The Russian Defense Ministry said Saturday that its troops had repelled a Ukrainian typical forces landing and killed each 11 soldiers who arrived by helicopter.

Influential Russian subject bloggers person reported nan dense usage of drones and smaller mobile units to disrupt Ukrainian defenses.

While nan nonstop business connected nan crushed remained unclear, subject analysts said that losing Pokrovsk would beryllium a bitter rustle for Ukraine arsenic it pushes for greater U.S. support.

"The nonaccomplishment of Pokrovsk would make Ukrainian logistics connected this beforehand complicated, summation nan consequence of losing aliases retreating from adjacent positions, and require a restructuring of nan protect lines," Viktor Kevliuk, a retired Ukrainian colonel now moving for nan Kyiv-based Center for Defense Strategies, said successful an interview.

Pokrovsk would beryllium Russia’s astir important territorial summation since it took nan eastbound metropolis of Avdiivka successful early 2024. Its seizure could origin a “domino effect,” but would still beryllium a constricted strategical summation improbable to displacement nan wide equilibrium of nan war, Kevliuk said.

People locomotion past a destroyed subject conveyance Saturday successful Kostiantynivka, successful nan Donetsk region.Yan Dobronosov / Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images

Other experts said it could bolster Putin's bargaining manus aft Trump called disconnected a planned acme and imposed new sanctions connected Russia past month.

"Moscow could besides effort to usage immoderate battlefield gains to unit Ukraine astatine nan negotiating array and seduce Trump to judge Russia’s terms," Mykola Bielieskov, a investigation chap astatine nan National Institute for Strategic Studies, said successful an interview.

“Ukraine is successful a difficult position. Politically, it is difficult to retreat from territory — particularly erstwhile nan force is trying to move section subject successes into broader strategical and negotiated victories,” said Bielieskov, who is besides a elder expert astatine Come Back Alive, a Ukrainian nongovernmental organization.

But, he said, successful applicable position keeping clasp of nan area was now “extremely challenging.”

Daryna Mayer reported from Kyiv, and Elmira Aliieva from London.