KRAMATORSK, Ukraine — Russian forces appeared Tuesday to tighten their chokehold on a strategic eastern city that has become the scene of one of the Ukraine war’s bloodiest battles, as fears mounted over the fate of hundreds of civilians trapped in an artillery-pounded industrial zone.
Ukraine insisted that its troops had not ceded control of Severodonetsk, a small industrial city seen as pivotal to the fight for the country’s Donbas region, but acknowledged that the situation was increasingly dire with Russia having severed the last bridge linking it to a sister city across the Seversky Donets River.
With the Russian invasion in the middle of its fourth month, Moscow is ramping up its defense spending as it presses its campaign to seize a huge swath of eastern Ukraine, British military analysts said Tuesday.
