Ukrainian forces are withdrawing from the front-line eastern town of Vuhledar, after more than two years of grinding battle, military officials said.
Kyiv’s military had fought hard to keep Vuhledar, which is perched on top of a tactically significant hill in the east and becomes the latest urban settlement to fall to the Russians.
It follows a vicious summer campaign along the eastern front that saw Kyiv cede several thousand square miles of territory.
Ukraine’s Khortytsia ground forces formation, which commands eastern regions including Donetsk, said in a statement posted on Telegram it was withdrawing troops from Vuhledar to “protect the military personnel and equipment”.
“In an attempt to take control of the city at any cost, reserves were directed to carry out flanking attacks, which exhausted the defence of the units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. As a result of the enemy’s actions, there arose a threat of encircling the city,” the statement added.
The tactical significance of the town, situated at the confluence of two major roads, is two-fold.
First, dominant heights and proximity to railway lines offer Moscow greater protection for their own logistics routes, and secondly, it offers a better vantage point for attacks against Ukrainian forces and supply lines feeding the south.
Its capture is another notch in Moscow’s belt, bringing it closer to the key logistics hub of Pokrovsk.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel