Russia takes control of a strategic Ukrainian city while Kyiv denies as fierce battles in the eastern front continues

Russia said Friday its forces had taken control of the eastern Ukrainian industrial city of Toretsk after months of fighting, a development that would be significant for Russian forces on the front if confirmed.

Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump announced that he will most likely meet his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky next week, while potential peace talks have been the subject of heated debate since his return to the White House.

“We always appreciate working with President Trump… We also plan to hold meetings and discussions at the team level… Currently, the Ukrainian and US teams are working on the details,” Zelensky wrote on X, without explicitly confirming that he would meet with Trump soon.

Trump also reiterated that he intends to hold talks with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.

On the ground, Russia has been seeking for months to control the industrial city of Toretsk, located in the Donetsk region (east), as this control would enable it to obstruct vital Ukrainian supply routes, however, Kyiv denied full Russian control over the city.

Military analysts say Russia’s capture of the mining town would help it disrupt Ukrainian military supply routes across the sprawling front line.

“As a result of active offensive operations… the city of Dzerzhinsk in the Donetsk People’s Republic has been liberated,” the Russian Defense Ministry said, using the Russian name for the city and region.

The city, which was once home to coal mines, had a population of about 30,000 before the Russian invasion in 2022, however, by last July, its population had fallen by 90% due to the fighting, according to the local administration.

At that time, it was inhabited by a small number of retirees who were unable or unwilling to leave, despite being subjected to daily shelling that caused widespread destruction and power and water outages.

Ahead of the Russian announcement, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said on Friday that the city had been reduced to ruins, and posted on X a picture of destroyed buildings.

“This was once someone’s home… It was a place where people lived, laughed and built their futures… Now it’s just a ruin”.

Drone footage recently released by Ukrainian journalists showed rubble and debris over Toretsk after eight months of systematic Russian bombardment.

Smoke can be seen rising from the remains of Soviet-era buildings that once lined the streets but have been reduced to piles of rubble.

A Ukrainian officer in the 28th Brigade fighting for control of Toretsk denied that Russian forces had fully taken control of the city.

He said Ukrainian forces were holding their positions on the outskirts of the city and facing further Russian attacks.

Russian military bloggers welcomed the news of the fall of Toretsk, describing it as a key stepping stone toward capturing the rest of the Donetsk region — the stated goal of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“Excuse me, but do we need negotiations at this rate?” wrote Russian military correspondent Alexander Kots, referring to possible ceasefire talks between Putin and Trump.

Putin has made capturing the Donbass region a priority since declaring it Russian territory in 2022.

Toretsk and the besieged town of Chasiv Yar, less than 20 kilometers to the north, are the last remaining urban areas preventing Russia from advancing further in the region, according to Russian military bloggers.

The Russian army is likely to use the capture of Toretsk to advance quickly into open fields west of the city, according to a report published by the Institute for the Study of War last month.

In another development, three people were killed in the Ukrainian border region of Sumy on Thursday-Friday night and their bodies were recovered from the rubble of a two-storey residential building, the prosecutor’s office announced on Friday.

The Public Prosecution Service said that shortly after midnight, Russian forces bombed the village of Miropilia in the Sumy region, located across the border with Russia and which is increasingly being subjected to shelling.

Sumy region lies on the border with Russia’s Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces launched a surprise attack six months ago, prompting Moscow to step up its bombardment of the industrial and agricultural region.

A drone strike on the city of Sumy late last month killed at least nine people in a residential building.