{"id":171500,"date":"2025-11-11T18:09:13","date_gmt":"2025-11-11T18:09:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/ukraine-russia-war-latest-zelensky-says-bad-weather-favours-moscow-in-difficult-battle-for-pokrovsk-the-independent\/"},"modified":"2025-11-11T18:09:13","modified_gmt":"2025-11-11T18:09:13","slug":"ukraine-russia-war-latest-zelensky-says-bad-weather-favours-moscow-in-difficult-battle-for-pokrovsk-the-independent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/ukraine-russia-war-latest-zelensky-says-bad-weather-favours-moscow-in-difficult-battle-for-pokrovsk-the-independent\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine-Russia war latest: Zelensky says bad weather favours Moscow in \u2018difficult\u2019 battle for Pokrovsk – The Independent"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The latest strike comes amid fierce fighting in the Donetsk region
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Volodymyr Zelensky<\/a> has said the military situation in Pokrovsk<\/a> remains \u201cdifficult\u201d, with the bad weather in the area favouring Russian<\/a> forces.
Sharing an update from Ukraine\u2019s <\/a>commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi, the Ukrainian president said Kyiv\u2019s \u201cmain focus right now is on the Pokrovsk direction and the Zaporizhzhia region, where the Russians are increasing the number and scale of assaults\u201d.
Ukrainian forces face a difficult situation in Pokrovsk \u201cin part because of weather conditions that favour the attacks\u201d, he said.
Russia deployed about 150,000 troops to drive towards the city in Ukraine\u2019s eastern Donetsk<\/a> region, Mr Syrskyi told the New York Post.
Kyiv\u2019s military said on Tuesday morning that there were believed to be around 300 Russian troops inside the town, which Moscow has been trying to capture for more than a year.
\u201cThe situation in Kupyansk is somewhat easier \u2013 our forces have achieved results there, and this has been the pattern for the past few weeks,\u201d Mr Zelensky added, referring to the northern city which Moscow on Wednesday claimed to have partial control over.
His comments came after Ukraine\u2019s military struck Russia’s Saratov oil refinery overnight<\/a>, causing explosions and a large fire in the area around the site in the latest attack on Russian energy facilities<\/a>.
Ukraine\u2019s military units are competing with each other by launching deadly drone attacks to earn points that can be used to buy more weapons.
Bryony Gooch has more below…<\/em><\/strong>
Russia said its forces had pushed deeper into the eastern Ukrainian cities of Pokrovsk and Kupiansk on Tuesday, with one video showing Russian soldiers rolling into Pokrovsk on motorbikes and even on the roofs of battered cars and vans.
Moscow says taking Pokrovsk, dubbed “the gateway to Donetsk” by Russian media, would give it a platform to drive north towards the two biggest remaining Ukrainian-controlled cities in the Donetsk region – Kramatorsk and Sloviansk.
Russia has been threatening Pokrovsk for more than a year, using a pincer movement to attempt to encircle it and threaten supply lines, rather than the deadly frontal assaults it employed to capture the city of Bakhmut in 2023.
Russian war bloggers published a video on Tuesday showing what they said were Russian forces entering Pokrovsk along a road enveloped in fog, in what some Telegram users said looked like scenes from the 1979 action film “Mad Max”, which unfolds in a post-apocalyptic landscape.
The video showed Russian forces on motorcycles and in an odd assortment of cars and other vehicles. Many vehicles, missing doors and windows, were shown driving along a road strewn with debris as soldiers looked on. Some Russian soldiers sat on the roof of a battered vehicle. A drone was seen beside the road.
Volodymyr Zelensky has said that weather conditions are favouring Russian forces in their quest to seize Pokrovsk, which looks increasingly imminent.
But why is that the case?
Although the Ukrainian president didn\u2019t go into more detail in his post on social media, it is likely to be a reference to the difficulties of operating drones in rain, wind and fog.
Drone warfare has transformed the way the Russia-Ukraine war has been carried out, and has been a lynchpin to Ukraine\u2019s fierce defense of its frontline.
Calm and clear days, with little or no wind, are the most favourable conditions for a drone pilot, ensuring GPS stability and strong satellite connection.
Conditions have been chilly around Pokrovsk, with night time temperatures dropping low into the single digits. There have been some showers, with more expected overnight on Tuesday, according to Accuweather.
This makes defending Pokrovsk, which relies heavily on drones for surveillance and precision strikes, all the more difficult under some already-tough conditions.
Volodymyr Zelensky has share a military update from commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi Russia\u2019s assaults on Pokrovsk and in the Zaporizhzhia region.
The situation remains \u201cdifficult\u201d in Pokrovsk, he said, adding that it is \u201cin part because of weather conditions that favour the attacks\u201d.
The Ukrainian president added: \u201cThe situation in Kupyansk is somewhat easier \u2013 our forces have achieved results there, and this has been the pattern for the past few weeks.\u201d
Ukrainian defensive forces are also focussed on the Zaporizhzhia region, where trhe Russians have been increasing the \u201cnumber and scale of assaults\u201d, he added.
Russian president Vladimir Putin gave no order to begin preparations for nuclear weapons testing, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.
“The president gave no instructions to begin preparations,” Peskov told state owned VGTRK.
“First of all, we must understand whether we should do it. This must be a serious, well-founded and thought-out decision. So our specialists will work on that.\u201d
Ukraine\u2019s special forces have struck a Russian oil depot in occupied Crimea, officials have said.
“The Hvardiyska oil depot is an important element of the fuel logistics system of the occupying authorities in Crimea,” the special forces stated on Telegram.
“It is important for supplying military facilities and transport of the enemy army.”
The Independent<\/em> could not independently verify the report.
Not a word of what the Russian defence ministry says is credible. Its claims that Russian troops have surrounded Ukrainian forces in Pokrovsk, Kostyantynivka and Kupiansk, in eastern Ukraine, are agitprop.
But Volodymyr Zelensky\u2019s statement from the front line that his country\u2019s fighters are \u201cunder pressure\u201d is something of an understatement.
Ukraine’s top military commander, Oleksandr Syrskyi, told the New York Post that Russia was concentrating some 150,000 troops on a drive to capture the town, which is much prized by Russia.
Dozens, perhaps hundreds, of Russian troops may have already successfully infiltrated the three tactically important towns.
Our world affairs editor Sam Kiley writes:<\/em><\/strong>
Russia\u2019s defence ministry has claimed that its forces have captured the village of Novouspenivske in Ukraine\u2019s Zaporizhzhia region.
The Independent cannot independently verify the report, but authoritative Ukrainian battlefield map DeepState indicates that Russian troops have surrounded the village.
We\u2019ll bring you more detail as we get it.
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
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Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged inSwipe for next articleThe latest strike comes amid fierce fighting in the Donetsk regionFrom reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":171501,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-171500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=171500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171500\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/171501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=171500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=171500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=171500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}