Russian forces advance towards strategic city of Pokrovsk in Ukraine's east

MOSCOW - Russian forces are just 1.5 km (1 mile) outside the Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk after Russian units pushed up from the south, and some advance groups of special forces have even entered the road and rail hub, pro-Russian war bloggers said on Friday.

Russia controls a large chunk of Ukraine and is advancing at the fastest pace since the early days of its invasion in 2022, according to open source maps.

The focus of Russia's advance since Ukraine carved out a slice of Russia's Kursk region in August is on the eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk where Russia currently controls over 60% of the territory.

A key part of the strategy is to take Pokrovsk, which would allow Moscow to disrupt Ukrainian supply lines along the eastern front and boost its campaign to capture the city of Chasiv Yar, which sits on higher ground offering potential control of a wider area.

Yuri Podolyaka, a prominent Ukrainian-born, pro-Russian military blogger, said Russian forces were now just 1.5 km from Pokrovsk after a push from the south.

Podolyaka said members of Russian sabotage and reconnaissance groups, essentially small special forces units which penetrate the front ahead of the advance, were already in the city.

Other Russian war bloggers such as Boris Rozhin gave similar accounts. Reuters was unable to verify battlefield accounts from either side due to reporting restrictions.

The Ukrainian military said on Wednesday that Russian troops had destroyed or captured several Ukrainian positions near Pokrovsk. There was no immediate comment from Kyiv on the latest developments.

The war is entering what some Russian and Western officials say could be its most dangerous phase as Moscow's forces advance and Ukraine fires U.S.-made ATACMS missiles into Russia.

Russian Defence Minister Andrei Belousov visited the Eastern Grouping of Russian forces that is fighting south of the strategic town of Kurakhove, about 35 km south of Pokrovsk.

Lieutenant General Andrei Ivanayev said the Eastern Grouping had taken over 300 sq km (116 square miles) in Ukraine over the past month, the defence ministry said.

The fall of Pokrovsk, an important logistics centre for the Ukrainian military, would be one of Ukraine's biggest military losses in months.

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 consolidate and advance the front line.

The city also hosts a mine which is Ukraine's only domestic coking coal supplier for its once-giant steel industry.

(Reporting by Reuters; editing by Guy Faulconbridge and Angus MacSwan)