Ukraine's military chief warns of 'significantly' worsening battlefield situation in the east

Ukraine's military chief on Saturday warned that the battlefield situation in the industrial east has "significantly worsened in recent days," as warming weather allowed Russian forces to launch a fresh push along several stretches of the more 1,000 km-long (620-mile) front line.

In an update on the Telegram messaging app, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyy said that Moscow had "significantly" ramped up its assaults since President Vladimir Putin extended his nearly quarter-century rule in a preordained election last month that saw anti-war candidates barred from the ballot and independent voices silenced in a Kremlin-backed media blockade.

According to Syrskyy, Russian forces have been "actively attacking" Ukrainian positions in three areas of the eastern Donetsk region, near the cities of Lyman, Bakhmut and Pokrovsk, and beginning to launch tank assaults as drier, warmer spring weather has made it easier for heavy vehicles to move across previously muddy terrain.

"Despite significant losses, the enemy is intensifying its efforts by using new units (equipped with) armored vehicles, thanks to which it periodically achieves tactical success," Syrskyy said.

A Russian Defense Ministry spokesman on Saturday confirmed the capture of a village that had been the site of fierce fighting for close to eighteen months. Analysts from Ukraine's non-governmental Deep State group, which tracks frontline developments, had reported on Russia's takeover of Pervomaiske, some 45 kilometers (28 miles) southeast of Pokrovsk, in the early hours of Thursday.

On Saturday, the group said in a Telegram update that Moscow's forces had also taken Bohdanivka, another eastern village close to the city of Bakhmut, where the war's bloodiest battle raged for nine months