Russian Forces Advance in Eastern Ukraine Ahead of Trump-Putin Talks

Russian troops have made swift progress in a key but narrow area of the front line in eastern Ukraine, according to reports from Kyiv and analysts on Tuesday, ahead of the upcoming talks between the Russian and U.S. presidents.

Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky said ahead of the Friday meeting in Alaska between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin that Moscow was laying the groundwork for further attacks, not peace, The Caspian Post reports citing foreign media.

The Ukrainian army said there had been fighting around the village of Kucheriv Yar in the Donetsk region, acknowledging new and speedy Russian gains.

The Ukrainian DeepState blog, which retains close connections with the military, showed Russian advances around 10 kilometres over around two days, punching deep into a narrow sliver of Ukraine on the front.

The corridor now apparently under Russian control threatens the town of Dobropillia, a mining hub that civilians are fleeing and that has been coming under Russian drone attacks.

It also further isolates the embattled and destroyed town of Kostiantynivka, which is one of the last large urban areas in the Donetsk region still held by Ukraine.

The Institute for the Study of War, a US-based observatory, said Russia was dispatching small sabotage groups forwards.

It said it was "premature" to call the Russian advances in the Dobropillia area "an operational-level breakthrough".

The Operational-Tactical Group Donetsk, which oversees parts of the front in the industrial region, also said Russia was probing Ukrainian lines with small sabotage groups, describing battles as "complex, unpleasant and dynamic".

Tatarigami_UA, a former Ukrainian army officer whose Frontelligence Insight analysis tracks the conflict, posted:

"In both 2014 and 2015, Russia launched major offensives ahead of negotiations to gain leverage. The current situation is serious, but far from the collapse some suggest."

Kyiv's military said earlier on Tuesday that Ukraine has retaken two villages in its eastern region of Sumy.

"It's tough. But we are holding back the enemy," Ukraine's top commander, Oleksandr Syrskyi, wrote on Facebook following a meeting on Tuesday with Zelensky and Ukraine's top brass.

"In the Sumy direction, we are conducting active operations and have some success advancing forward, liberating Ukrainian land."