Ukrainian officials urged civilians to evacuate Pokrovsk, a strategic logistics center in Donetsk, as Russia is accelerating its advance into the area.
The pace of evacuations from Pokrovsk in Donetsk, where Russian troops are advancing, has increased to 500 to 600 people per day, according to Serhii Dobriak, head of the Pokrovsk military administration.
He estimated that, given the pace of the Russian advance, Pokrovsk residents would have one to two weeks to evacuate. Local authorities said they were urging people to leave now to ensure a controlled evacuation. If the evacuation was delayed as Russia moved closer, chaos would ensue.
Currently, all services and institutions in Pokrovsk are still operating. However, Mr. Dobriak predicts that they will soon stop in the near future.
“As of today, everything in Pokrovsk is still working, and all services are fully operational, including water, electricity, gas, public transport , shops, markets, banks, courts, the state migration service and the administrative service center. Everything is still working for now. But we understand that within a week, these activities will gradually end,” he said.
“Before the war, we had 13,700 children. Now, the community has only 4,788 children, which means about a third are still there… I believe that this week we will be forced to evacuate children,” said Mr. Dobriak.
He said about 60% of residents leave Pokrovsk on their own.
“Yesterday, 490 people left. Of those, only 135 went by train. The rest were left in their cars, with their belongings and trailers. We can easily evacuate at least 1,000 people. We have enough resources for this. People just need to leave.”
Pokrovsk is a transportation hub, located on a major road and a vital supply route to other Ukrainian outposts in the region. If Russia were to capture Pokrovsk, Ukraine would face a major challenge in holding other fronts in Donetsk.
Russian forces have been advancing towards Pokrovsk for months, capturing a series of villages in recent weeks as they seek to reach the city’s outskirts.
The Pokrovsk front remains one of the hottest areas on the more than 1,000km frontline. Over the past month, it has seen the highest number of clashes between Russia and Ukraine.
Moscow’s advances in Donbas come as Ukraine launches an unprecedented cross-border offensive into Russia’s Kursk region, where Kiev claims control of dozens of Moscow settlements.
In recent days, many Western opinions have said that Ukraine is taking a risk by sending some of its forces from the Eastern Front to Kursk to fight. Sharing resources in weapons and manpower to protect the Donbas region could weaken Ukraine’s defense capabilities, creating conditions for Russia to advance deeper into the area controlled by Kiev.
