The stronghold city of Pokrovsk in the heart of the Donbas now risks “becoming a graveyard for Ukraine’s finest,” Euromaidan Press reports as Russian forces expand their control and threaten to encircle hundreds of Ukraine’s best troops in a pocket around the nearby town of Myrnohrad.

As bne IntelliNews reported, a small group of about 250 Russian forces entered the city at the end of last week and by November 1 started to rout the defenders, singling out drone operators in particular.

The next day the fighting intensified as Ukraine's Main Directorate of Intelligence (HUR) mounted a bold counteroffensive that turned the tide of the battle and pushed the Russian invaders back, keeping vital supply lines open.

Since then, the reports from the city, largely by military bloggers (milblogger) and Bankova, have become confused by claim and counterclaim. Some milbloggers report that the HUR troops defences are holding up, others that Ukraine’s troops in Myrnohrad 5km to the east are already cut off.

Ukraine’s Defence Ministry said on November 3 that it stopped the Russian attempt to advance north of Pokrovsk, but it remains semi-circled by Russian forces and the site of fierce fighting, The Kyiv Independent reports.

The Ministry added the Seventh Rapid Response Corps of Ukraine’s Air Assault Forces special operations units blocked a Russian effort to cut a supply route between Pokrovsk and nearby Rodynske to the northeast, killing 19 Russian soldiers, The Kyiv Independent reports. The situation in adjacent Myrnohrad that protects Pokrovsk’s northern flank is “tense but not critical.”

“Pokrovsk is holding: a joint operation by the Ukrainian Defence Ministry and the Armed Forces of Ukraine is underway in the city,” according to milblogger @Heroiam_Slava. “Ukrainian units stabilize the situation, drive the enemy out of the industrial zone and cut off their supply routes. Helicopters deliver reinforcements, and units on the ground advance and consolidate control over key areas. This is a real counteroffensive at the local level, where intelligence and the army act as one. The Russians are forced to retreat, and Ukrainian forces regain control over key areas.”

Nevertheless, the AFR appears to have retaken control of a large part of Pokrovsk in the last two days. According to the latest reports, Russian forces control approximately 60% of Pokrovsk but are still facing HUR elite troops flown into the city by Black Hawk helicopters at the weekend. These forces are mounting a fierce defence of AFU positions personally overseen by HUR chief Kyrylo Budanov.

The situation seems to be deteriorating as the route out of the pocket held by the AFU, connecting Pokrovsk to Myrnohrad, has shrunk to a mere 1km, according to milblogger @AMK_Mapping, threatening to trap hundreds of Ukraine’s best paratroopers in a “Kessel” that caught Germany’s troops at the end of the siege of Stalingrad. Other reports claim that Russian forces have also captured Rivne at the mouth of the Myrnohrad salient, which would mean the Ukrainian defenders are already trapped in the Kessel.

Bankova continues to deny its troops are surrounded and that while the situation is “difficult” it still has control over the situation. Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi on November 3 stated that a “complex operation” is underway in Pokrovsk to destroy and repel Russian forces.

At risk are not only fighting men’s lives but the loss of control over Ukraine’s extensive Defensive Line fortifications in the Donetsk region that poses a major obstacle to Russia’s further advances, as well as the logistics hub that supplies much of Ukraine’s eastern front defences.

“A catastrophe is unfolding in the strategic city of Pokrovsk, where thousands of Ukrainian soldiers are encircled. However, the media downplays the situation to maintain public support for the war as some Europeans might start calling for a return to diplomacy,” Professor Glenn Diesen of the Russian Foreign Policy, Greater Eurasia & Geoeconomics institute said in a social media post.

The situation remains critical and some observers are calling on Ukraine’s high command to withdraw from Pokrovsk in the face of the AFR's relentless, but slow and costly, advances. Founder of Ukraine's Come Back Alive foundation, Vitali Deineha, says units should be withdrawn from the city to avoid unjustified casualties and a serious weakening of the front, Euromaidan Press reported.

Regardless of the details of the battle in the city, it is clear that the AFR are continuing to make slow progress.

“The trend of Russians gaining roughly 400-500 km2 per month continues. Last month, most of the land was lost in the Dnipropetrovsk-Eastern Zaporizhzhia direction. Even though the Russians advanced, they did it in a less operationally significant area,” according to Emil Kastehelmi, a military analyst with the Black Bird Group, who also admits the situation is very confused by conflicting reports.

The Russians occupied over 200km² of Ukrainian territory on the Pokrovske - Huliaipole front in the last month, according to Black Bird. At the same time milblogger DeepState assessed the AFR to have taken 267 km².

“The Pokrovsk-Dobropillia-direction and Kupiansk are examples of the most difficult areas from a mapping point of view. Troops are often mixed in the grey zone and small groups can still hold singular positions behind the assessed level of Russian control,” Kastehelmi adds.

Russia has concentrated nearly 170,000 troops on the Pokrovsk front, according to the reports, and outnumber the Ukrainian defenders nearly eight-to-one. AFR troops continue to infiltrate the city and conduct free reconnaissance from drones. Meanwhile, Ukrainian soldiers refuse to leave the ground.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on October 28 that Russian forces are trying to capture Pokrovsk in order to convince the Trump administration that Russia is capable of taking all of eastern Ukraine. Putin wants Pokrovsk so that he can claim a victory in front of the Russian people and wind down the costly war that is doing increasing damage to the Russian economy, according to Zelenskiy.