On Monday, Zelensky said Russia had had “no success” in Pokrovsk in recent days but acknowledged that “things were not easy” for Ukrainian forces in the area.
He added that a third of all front line clashes were happening in Pokrovsk, and a half of all glide bombs used by the Russians were launched at the town. Earlier last week the Ukrainian president said that Moscow’s troops in the area were outnumbering Kyiv’s eight to one.
Some Ukrainian commentators have criticised the government’s efforts to continue to defend Pokrovsk, arguing that troops were being put at risk.
In a post accompanying the pictures of his visit to Dobropillya, Zelensky on Tuesday wrote: “This is our country, this is our East, and we will certainly do our utmost to keep it Ukrainian.”
Russia now controls 81% of the Donetsk region and 99% of neighbouring Luhansk, which collectively make up the Donbas.
Moscow has never relented in its ambition to capture the entirety of the area, which Russia’s President Vladimir Putin declared annexed in 2022 despite not being in full control of it.
However, its progress along the front line has been grinding and occupying the heavily fortified towns in northern Donetsk could come at a huge cost of both manpower and resources.
Away from the front line, Russia continues to pummel Ukrainian cities, targeting the country’s energy facilities as winter draws in.
A large-scale drone attack overnight Monday targeted the southern port of Odesa on the Black Sea, damaging industrial facilities, causing fires and affecting the local power supply. At least 15 civilians were killed and 44 injured in combined drone and missile attacks across the country at the weekend.
Ukraine continues to hit back, mostly using drones to target industrial sites across Russia and border regions.
On Tuesday, Kyiv said it had attacked a petrochemical plant in the Bashkortostan region and a refinery in the Nizhny Novgorod region, while earlier this week, a drone explosion killed a woman and injured three others in the Russian border region of Belgorod.