Europe | A bloody trade

Danger in Donbas as Ukraine’s front line falters

Russian fighters are trying to encircle the defenders

A local woman walks past the impact crater after a Russian strike on a residential area in Pokrovsk amid Russia's attack on Ukraine.
Photograph: Reuters
|Kurakhove

IF YOU IMAGINE that the front lines in Donbas are well-defined, you should think again. Oleksandr, an officer with Ukraine’s 79th brigade, watches the battlefield near the frontline town of Kurakhove on control-room screens every day. The Russians are mostly in front of Ukrainian positions, he says, but sometimes cause havoc kilometres behind them. For the wretched pairs of soldiers in scattered positions at the edge of what he calls the kill zone, it is more often than not a one-way mission. As many as 18 Russian soldiers might die to dislodge two worn, hungry Ukrainians. But eventually, they will. “We are exchanging lives and territory for time and the opponent’s resources.”

Explore more

This article appeared in the Europe section of the print edition under the headline “The Russian push”

From the September 14th 2024 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

Discover more

Miners work underground near the city of Pokrovsk, Ukraine.

Why Russia is trying to seize a vital Ukrainian coal mine

Without it, the country’s remaining steel industry will be crippled

The search for Ukraine’s missing soldiers and sailors

The families of missing loved ones are trying to find them, alive or dead


A big truck emblazoned with the US flag on the side and the words MAGA above the cab (which resembles Donald Trump's face) flies over the brow of a hill. A startled deer is caught in the headlights

Europe could become Trump’s geopolitical roadkill

A second dose of MAGA will put the EU in a pickle


Russia continues to advance in eastern Ukraine

But it is encountering growing problems

Turkey’s long hard struggle with inflation

High interest rates are starting to do the trick

Delays on Italy’s spruced-up trains have got worse

Matteo Salvini is making feeble excuses