Residents of Ukraine's besieged Pokrovsk hunker down as Russia advances

By Vitalii Hnidyi and Dan Peleschuk

POKROVSK, Ukraine/KYIV (Reuters) - Ukrainian pensioner Oleksandr Sopov barely reacts to the boom of artillery outside Pokrovsk, the eastern city where fierce battles are raging between Russian and Ukrainian forces.

"What should I be afraid of? I'm 64 years old - I've lived already," he said.

Sopov is among thousands of residents who remain as Russian troops advance on the strategic city, part of their grinding march across the industrial Donbas region.

Moscow is moving at its fastest rate on the battlefield since 2022, capturing village after village as both sides vie for the upper hand ahead of expected peace efforts next year.

Ukrainian officials have said Kremlin troops are just 3 km (2 miles) from Pokrovsk, whose capture could severely compromise Ukrainian supply lines on much of the eastern front.

Yet more than 10,000 residents of the city's pre-war population of 60,000 remain, authorities and rescuers say.

Electricity supplies, water and heating have largely been cut. Some buildings have been heavily damaged in the fighting, and a bridge has partially collapsed.

In mostly empty streets, locals press on with their lives, riding bicycles and selling holiday wares amid the near-constant din of duelling artillery.

Many of those interviewed by Reuters said they refuse to leave because they had nowhere else to go and few financial resources. Some, like shopkeeper Oksana Yarova, said they had returned after briefly evacuating earlier in the war.

"I don't want to go anywhere," the 44-year-old said. "I don't want to slum around."

Her customers include the miners still working at Ukraine's only coking coal mine about 10 km west of Pokrovsk. It is currently running at 50% capacity, industry sources told Reuters.

Sopov, the pensioner, said living costs elsewhere are at least double residents' monthly pensions of around $100, making evacuation impossible for many.

"And that's just for housing. You still need to eat," he added.

RUSSIA'S RELENTLESS ADVANCE

Around Pokrovsk alone, Russia has thrown some 70,000 troops into battle, a Ukrainian military spokesman said this week.

It is one of several sectors along a 1,000-km frontline where Ukraine's outmanned and outgunned military has struggled to fend off relentless Russian assaults.

Emil Kastehelmi, an intelligence analyst with the Finland-based Black Bird Group, said a rapid collapse of the city was unlikely and multiple fortifications remained in place.

"But some defensive points, which in theory should have stayed longer in Ukrainian hands, have fallen surprisingly quickly," he told Reuters in written comments.

Around 40 km to the south, Russians have stormed into the city of Kurakhove and are threatening to encircle a broad area around it, according to DeepState, a Ukrainian group mapping the fighting.

Far from the trenches, Moscow is waging a campaign of air strikes on critical infrastructure that is hobbling Ukraine's fragile energy grid as winter takes hold.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said he wants to achieve peace by diplomatic means next year, but only if Ukraine is bolstered by security guarantees from Western partners that would stave off new attacks by Russia.

Some frontline troops said they did not currently see an opportunity for peace talks.

"I believe Ukraine will achieve victory when there will be an understanding that we can defend our country and prevent a repeat of the tragedies that happened," said a drone pilot in the 21st Special Purpose Battalion, known by his military callsign "Brain".

He spoke near the embattled eastern city of Toretsk in an area where Russian forces are advancing toward the regional logistics hub of Kostiantynivka, which links to several key cities further north.

While casualties have mounted on both sides, Ukraine says it is less willing than Russia to expend soldiers' lives.

Zelenskiy said this month around 43,000 Ukrainian troops had been killed since Russia launched its full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022. Western estimates of the toll are greater, and significantly higher still for Russia.

Khrystyna Siomova, a medic in Ukraine's 5th Separate Assault Brigade stationed west of Chasiv Yar, another scene of heavy fighting, said the weight of those losses is what kept her comrades-in-arms going.

"Every step we take is not just our own, but a collective step together with those we've lost."

(Additional reporting by Anastasiia Malenko and Inna Varenytsia; Editing by Mike Collett-White and Andrew Heavens)