War in Ukraine: Russia is nibbling territory in the east, where the situation on the front “has worsened”

The Russian steamroller continues its progress in eastern Ukraine. The situation on the front “worsened” this weekend, Oleksandr Syrsky, the commander-in-chief of the Kiev armed forces, lamented on Facebook on Sunday. Russia, he added, is “actively attacking all along the front line, [and] achieving tactical successes in some sectors.”

This Monday, the Russian Ministry of Defense claimed in a press release to have “liberated” Semenivka, northwest of Avdiïvka, a fortress town in the Donetsk region taken by Moscow in February. Moscow had already claimed the day before the capture of a village in the area and is seeking to accumulate the captures before May 9, Victory Day, commemorating the end of the Second World War, a public holiday on the occasion.

The “most difficult situation” is in the Pokrovsk and Kurakhové area, also in the Donetsk oblast, in the east of the country. To the north of these two localities, the situation is also critical in Kramatorsk, the main city of Donbass still under Ukrainian control. This industrial city is an essential railway and logistics hub of kyiv.

Before reaching it, Russian troops are on the offensive to take the town of Chassiv Yar, a Ukrainian defensive lock located at an altitude of 200 meters. The conquest of this industrial locality crossed by a canal - an advantage for the defenders - would allow Russia to engage in the eastern region of Ukraine.

Vladimir Putin's army has “long aimed to capture four large cities that form a belt of fortress in the Donetsk oblast (Slovyansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka and Kostyantynivka),” noted the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) in a bulletin dated April 28. “Chasiv Yar is operationally important because it would provide Russian forces with a base to launch offensive operations against Druzhkivka and Kostyantynivka,” the US-based think tank added.

For his part, Oleksandr Syrsky explained that his troops “moved to new borders west of Berdychiv, Semenivka and Novomykhailivka (...) thus protecting the life and health of our defenders”.

A bit like Avdiivka, the town of Krasnohorivka is one of the last Ukrainian locks that protect the south of the Donetsk oblast. “Russian bloggers claimed that Russian forces had advanced further west into Krasnohorivka, but had not yet captured the brick factory in the center of the town,” reports ISW. Ukraine, for its part, says its troops “continue to contain the enemy.”

At this stage of the conflict, ISW estimates, Russian forces have gained 505 square kilometers of territory “since the launch of offensive operations in October 2023”, including “nearly 100 square kilometers” only since the start of the year.