Russia reports conquest of the village of Sokil
The Russian advance in Ukraine appears to be continuing. The Russian Defense Ministry in Moscow reports the capture of another village. The capture demonstrates that Ukraine cannot stabilize the front in that sector.
The Russian military claims to have captured another village in eastern Ukraine, in the Donetsk region. The army's Central Group managed to take control of the village of Sokil, improving its tactical position, according to the Russian Defense Ministry in Moscow. The Ukrainian side has not commented on the reports yet. The reports from the warring parties can only be verified with some delay. The Deepstate portal, which is close to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, had already assigned Sokil to Russian occupiers at the end of June.
The village of Sokil is located next to the significantly larger and long-contested town of Ocheretyne. In a census before 2001, the village in the Pokrovsk district had only a few dozen inhabitants. The industrial and mining city of Pokrovsk, 40 kilometers away and also named Pokrovsk, is one of the possible targets of the Russian advance in that area. Russian troops have advanced towards it since the fall of the fortress Avdiivka in the past few months.
Russian troops have recently reported the capture of a neighborhood in the heavily contested city of Chassiw Jar. Independent military bloggers have since confirmed the takeover, but they say that the city was not previously under imminent threat.
"The 'Flower' is beginning to 'bloom'"
In a conversation with ntv.de, Austrian Colonel Markus Reisner explained at the beginning of the week that Russian troops control the initiative along the entire front, meaning they determine where the fighting takes place. "In two heavyweight areas, they are making progress: on the one hand in the area of Chassiw Jar and at Ocheretyne in the Donbass," Reisner said.
At Ocheretyne, Russian troops reportedly managed to breach the second line of Ukrainian army defenses. "The 'Flower,' so the Russians call it, has begun to 'bloom,'" Reisner said. "Smaller settlements with 500 to 1000 inhabitants, whose names you've never heard before, are fiercely contested. They eventually fall after weeks of fighting to the Russians."
The Russian tactics, according to Reisner, currently look like this: "The Russian troops do not only shoot with artillery and multiple rocket launchers, but they also drop bombs deliberately. With their enormous explosive power, they can knock out entire Ukrainian strongholds, followed by an attack. Then smaller elements come into play. One or two armored personnel carriers, a tank, often also four to five motorcycles or unarmored, but nimble buggies."
The ongoing conflict in Donbass, specifically the Donetsk region, has seen another village, Sokil, being captured by Russian forces. This attack on Ukraine continues to shift the political landscape in the region.
The Russian advance in the Donbass region, with the recent capture of Sokil and Ocheretyne, poses a significant threat to the industrial city of Pokrovsk, located 40 kilometers away.
