Russia Ukraine war latest: Putin’s forces claim capture of strategic town as Zelensky makes demand for Trump peace talks – UK Times

Volodymyr Zelensky defended mobilisation of Ukrainians fighting in the war against Russia, stating that if the army goes back home then Vladimir Putin “will kill us all”.

“The wartime situation calls for mobilisation of people and all the resources we have in the country. Absolutely all of them,” Mr Zelensky said in the interview, excerpts of which were posted on the president’s Telegram channel.

“And, unfortunately, that is the challenge of this war and that is why we have to speed things up to the maximum to end it, to oblige Russia to end this war,” he said.

“Today, we are defending ourselves. If tomorrow, for instance, half the army heads home, we really should have surrendered on the very first day. That is how it is. If half the army goes home, Putin will kill us all.”

Ukraine approved legislation last year lowering the age of mobilisation for Ukrainian men from 27 to 25 years, narrowing exemptions and imposing penalties on evaders.

An overnight Russian air attack set a private business on fire in Kharkiv, said the mayor of the city in northeastern Ukraine.

“There is a large-scale fire,” mayor Ihor Terekhov said. “All emergency services are on site. There is no information about potential casualties at this time,” he said on his Telegram channel.

Kharkiv city has been under intermittent Russian fire since the start of the war and has been the scene of some of the hottest clashes on the frontline.

Russian forces are closing in on the strategically important eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk after capturing a string of villages to its south, and Ukraine has halted production at its only coking coal mine nearby due to the advance.

Pokrovsk is a road and rail hub in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, which had a pre-war population of some 60,000 people. While most people have fled, Ukraine estimated last month that up to 11,000 still remain in the city.

It lies on a key road used by the Ukrainian military to supply other embattled eastern outposts including the towns of Chasiv Yar and Kostiantynivka in the Donetsk region.

Ukraine’s only mine that produces coking coal – used in its once vast steel industry and vital for the country’s pre-war economy – is just a 20-minute drive to the west of Pokrovsk, and open source data shows Russian forces are less than 2 km (1.24 miles) from one of the mine shafts.

Moscow says it has annexed Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region and sees taking control of Pokrovsk as an important stepping stone to incorporating the entire region into Russia. Kyiv and the West reject Russia’s territorial claims as illegal and accuse Moscow of prosecuting a war of colonial conquest.

Control of the city, which the Russian media call “the gateway to Donetsk”, would allow Moscow to severely disrupt Ukrainian supply lines along the eastern front and boost its campaign to capture Chasiv Yar, which sits on higher ground offering potential control of a wider area.

Squeezing the Ukrainian military’s access to the road network in the vicinity would make it harder for Kyiv’s troops to hold pockets of territory either side of Pokrovsk, which could allow Russia to advance the front line.