Ukrainian President Visits Battle Frontline At Pokrovsk

JAKARTA - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited the eastern frontline city of Pokrovsk, where Russia launched a month-long relentless infantry attack.

The visit comes a day before Kyiv commemorated the 1,000 days since Russia's massive invasion at a critical pace following Donald Trump's victory in the US election, which promised to end the war without explaining how.

Zelenskyy handed over a military award as he met with deputies from several fighting units to defend Pokrovsk, the site of a large coal mine, which Russian troops are trying to seize, advancing within about 8 km of the city's pinggrian.

"I know thanks to your strength the Eastern region has not been fully occupied by the Russian Federation," Zelenskiy said in a video reported by Reuters on Monday, November 18.

Russia has occupied a fifth of Ukraine and has made the fastest progress since 2022 in recent months.

Fronts near Pokrovsk and other fronts near the city of Kurrakhove have witnessed Russia's most violent attacks for months.

Pokrovsk is located at highway intersections and railroads that make it an important logistics point for the military and civilians.

Its coal mine is the only one in Ukraine that produces kokas coal that is important for the national steel industry.

The military said its troops managed to dispel more than 30 Russian attacks near Pokrovsk in just the past day.

Zelenskyy's office said he also visited other areas of the Donetsk region to examine the progress of the fort construction and discuss preparations for a coming winter with regional officials.

Most of the critical infrastructure for the supply of water, electricity and natural gas has been destroyed in the Donetsk region, as major and small cities are targeted daily artillery, drones, missiles, and guided bombs.

Vadim Filashkin, governor of the region, said about 324,000 civilians were still in the Kyiv-controlled territory, down from about 2 million civilians in the same region before the invasion.

The Donetsk region, where Russian proxy forces launched an uprising in 2014, is one of four provinces in Ukraine that Moscow claims to have annexed by Moscow by the end of 2022.

Moscow says it is seizing the remainder of the province is one of their main war destinations.