Ukrainian Army reports thousands of artillery shells fired as Russians advance in southeastern Zaporizhia region.<\/p>\n
Published On 12 Nov 202512 Nov 2025<\/p>\n
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Ukraine\u2019s top military commander has conceded that the army\u2019s situation has \u201csignificantly worsened<\/a>\u201d in parts of the southern Zaporizhia region, where Ukrainian forces have withdrawn from five villages after intense fighting against Russian troops.<\/p>\n News of the setback in Zaporizhia in southeastern Ukraine comes as Russia said earlier on Tuesday that its forces had pushed deeper into the eastern Ukrainian cities of Pokrovsk<\/a> and Kupiansk.<\/p>\n Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list<\/p>\n Video footage published by Russian war bloggers shows Moscow\u2019s troops riding motorcycles, travelling in battered cars and sitting on top of military vehicles as they poured into Pokrovsk, which Russian media has dubbed \u201cthe gateway to Donetsk\u201d due to its strategic location.<\/p>\n \u201cUsing its numerical superiority in personnel and materiel, the enemy advanced in fierce fighting and captured three settlements,\u201d the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Oleksandr Syrskii, said of the fighting in Zaporizhia on Tuesday.<\/p>\n \u201cThe situation has significantly worsened in the Oleksandrivka and Huliapole directions,\u201d Syrskii said in a statement.<\/p>\n The Ukrainian Army said earlier that orders to withdraw from five villages in Zaporizhia were given after the \u201cde facto destruction of all shelters and fortifications\u201d following intensive Russian artillery strikes. An estimated 2,000 shells were launched at the Ukrainian positions.<\/p>\n Control of three other villages is also being hotly contested between Russian and Ukrainian forces northeast of the town of Huliapole in Zaporizhia, according to the Ukrainian Army.<\/p>\n Syrskii said that Russian forces in Zaporizhia had used poor weather conditions<\/a> to their advantage, advancing under heavy fog to infiltrate between Ukrainian positions in the region. But he added that Russian forces suffered heavy losses during their attacks.<\/p>\n \u201cEvery metre of our land costs Russia hundreds of military lives,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who was visiting the parts of the southern Kherson region not occupied by Russia on Tuesday, described the situation in Pokrovsk and Zaporizhia as \u201cdifficult, in part because of weather conditions that favour the attacks\u201d.<\/p>\n The battlefield situation in Kupiansk was \u201csomewhat easier\u201d, he said, adding that Ukrainian forces had \u201cachieved results there\u201d.<\/p>\n Russia has been threatening Pokrovsk for more than a year, using a pincer movement to attempt to encircle it and threaten supply lines.<\/p>\n Syrskii told US media that Russia has concentrated an estimated 150,000 troops in a drive to take Pokrovsk.<\/p>\n Russia and Ukraine have given conflicting accounts of the battle in recent days, with Moscow claiming for days that it had encircled Pokrovsk, while Kyiv has denied the claims and asserted that it still had supply lines to neighbouring Myrnohrad.<\/p>\n Russia also said its forces have taken full control of the eastern part of Kupiansk in Ukraine\u2019s Kharkiv region, located to the northeast of Zaporizhia and Pokrovsk.<\/p>\n A Russian commander, who gave his call sign as Hunter, said his forces had taken control of an oil depot on Kupiansk\u2019s eastern edge. In a video statement issued by Russia\u2019s Ministry of Defence, the commander said his forces had also taken control of a series of train stops south of Kupiansk.<\/p>\n Military observers have noted a thinning of Ukraine\u2019s front lines due to a severe shortage of soldiers and massive Russian drone superiority, which has led to advances in several locations along the front line in the more than three and a half years of war<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ukrainian Army reports thousands of artillery shells fired as Russians advance in southeastern Zaporizhia region. 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