Ukrainian forces lost a command post in the Huliaipole sector and allowed Russian troops to advance after the 102nd Brigade failed to hold its defenses, Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said in an interview with 24 Channel published on Dec. 29.
The remarks come as Russian forces continue assaults on Huliaipole in Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
The Ukrainian monitoring group DeepState has designated the city as a “gray zone,” indicating ongoing fighting and uncertain control. Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Dec. 28 that Russian forces had taken control of the city, but Ukraine denied the claim.
The situation in the Huliaipole sector stemmed from what Syrskyi described as an unstable defense by the 102nd Territorial Defense Brigade. When troops abandoned the command post, they left behind military equipment, flags, soldiers’ personal belongings, and materials that may have contained sensitive information.
Syrskyi said Ukrainian forces had the opportunity to destroy the equipment and materials before withdrawing to prevent them from falling into Russian hands, but failed to do so.
“The battalion command could have been structured differently,” Syrskyi said, adding that reinforcements from the 5th Assault Brigade were already on their way to the battalion at the time.
“The military law enforcement agency is currently conducting an investigation,” Syrskyi said. “The battalion commander’s actions will be subject to a legal review in the first instance.”
Despite the withdrawal of a unit from the 102nd Brigade, the 225th Assault Regiment is holding the line in Huliaipole, Syrskyi said.
On Dec. 29, Ukraine’s Southern Operational Command spokesperson Vladyslav Voloshyn described the fighting in Huliaipole as intense and ongoing in an interview with the Kyiv Independent.
“There is no clear front line anymore — it’s a continuous field of battle,” Voloshyn said.
Huliaipole was long viewed as one of the more stable areas of the front line despite its proximity to the contact line. That stability has eroded in recent months as Russian forces accelerated their advance in Zaporizhzhia Oblast and intensified broader offensive operations beginning in the spring.
Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Oblast (Nizar al-Rifai/The Kyiv Independent)
While fighting continues in Huliaipole in Zaporizhzhia Oblast, Ukrainian troops withdrew on Dec. 23 from the town of Siversk in Donetsk Oblast, which had been the site of weeks of heavy combat.
Siversk became another city to fall to Russian forces on their advance toward Sloviansk, one of the region’s largest cities, about 30 kilometers (20 miles) west.
Ukrainian soldiers have withdrawn from the settlement, “in order to save lives and maintain the combat capability of units,” the General Staff said.
Ukrainian forces were forced to retreat due to a growing number of Russian fiber-optic drones, particularly those with a flight range of more than 20 kilometers (12 miles), Syrskyi said. As a result, Ukrainian units gradually pulled back deeper into their territory.
“We thus left the infantry unprotected. And in these conditions, the defense of Siversk became problematic, to say the least,” Syrskyi said.
The Siversk sector had long been a low priority because Russian forces had been unable to advance there and fighting had been less intense than in other areas, Syrskyi added. But the drones changed the situation.
“It would have been wrong to leave the troops and units that were defending there to simply die. Therefore, the appropriate decision was made. We retreated to the dominant heights,” Syrskyi said.
Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast (Nizar al-Rifai/The Kyiv Independent)
Despite advancing toward Sloviansk, the main target for the Russian army in the Donetsk region remains the city of Pokrovsk, which Russia has tried to seize for more than a year.
“For 17 months, the Russian army has been storming Pokrovsk, Myrnohrad, and other settlements that are part of the agglomeration,” Syrskyi said. “The first statements that Pokrovsk would fall were made back in September last year.”
Russian forces currently control half of the city, but the entrance to the city is under the control of Ukrainian drones, complicating Russian operations, according to Syrskyi.
Syrskyi added that the Ukrainian army continues to hold Pokrovsk under difficult conditions, as the city provides a strategic line of defense that is hard to break.
“The enemy is now launching almost 50% of all KAB (precision-guided bomb) strikes in this direction, trying to destroy buildings, especially high-rises. It is suffering losses, it cannot advance as it would like, and so the struggle continues,” the commander-in-chief said.
Pokrovsk, a key fortress city in Donetsk Oblast, has been one of the most fiercely contested areas of the front line, with Ukrainian forces holding off a major Russian assault for the past year. Myrnohrad is a satellite town of Pokrovsk, located less than 3 kilometers (2 miles) away.
Roughly half of Pokrovsk is under Russian control, while Russian forces are advancing on Myrnohrad from three directions, gradually encircling the city, according to the Ukrainian mapping and analysis group DeepState.
