Russian forces have captured the Donbass village of Umanskoye, which is located several kilometers north of a strategically important highway near the city of Donetsk, and west of Avdeevka, the Defense Ministry has said.
The ministry confirmed the settlement was taken by unspecified units of the Russian ‘Center’ group of troops on Saturday. Numerous Russian and Ukrainian telegram channels had claimed that Moscow’s forces had already secured Umanskoye in late May, reporting the presence of a Russian motorized brigade in the area.
As early as May 9, several Russian Telegram channels posted a video purporting to show a Soviet victory banner flying over Umanskoye. Other clips claimed to show intense fighting in the area, including artillery and drone strikes on Ukrainian trenches.
The settlement of Umanskoye is located several kilometers north of the village of Netaylovo, which sits on the E50 highway that runs through Donbass and all of Ukraine.
According to Igor Kimakovsky, an adviser to the head of the Russian Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), the Ukrainian military had often used the settlement to shell Donetsk. He added that its capture would allow control of most of the highway leading to the strategically important city of Pokrovsk located further west, complicating Kiev’s efforts to supply its troops in the surrounding areas.
Russian troops have been making steady advances in Donbass for several weeks, while in early May Moscow’s forces also launched a series of attacks in the border Kharkov Region, pushing back Ukrainian troops. The development forced Kiev to send reinforcements to the Kharkov front by pulling units from other areas.