After Key Town Falls in Ukraine’s East, Russian Forces Push Into Another

A week after Russia captured Vuhledar, a town that anchored Ukraine’s defenses in the country’s southeast, Moscow’s forces are continuing to advance in the area, pushing into or flanking several towns as they try to break through Ukrainian lines.

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The fierce fighting in the area reflects the Kremlin’s longstanding goal of capturing all of the Donetsk region, which it already partly controls. “This is clearly what the Russians are aiming at,” said Franz-Stefan Gady, a Vienna-based military analyst. “As a result, this is where the heaviest fighting is happening.”

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Mr. Paroinen and Mr. Gady said that Russian forces had increasingly employed encirclement tactics to pressure Ukrainian troops into retreating. They push through weak points in Ukrainian defenses, and capture narrow strips of land to form pincers around Ukrainian positions before tightening the noose, they said.

Russian troops have now partly succeeded in forming a semicircle around Selydove, a town about 10 miles southeast of Pokrovsk. Its capture would facilitate Russian attempts to flank Pokrovsk.

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