Intense fighting is continuing in and around the city of Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk region, with Moscow deploying around 100,000 troops into battle in a bid to capture the strategic centre.

Pokrovsk is considered a key logistics hub and military supply route in eastern Ukraine, and Russia has long seen it as a vital gateway to taking the rest of the Donetsk region.

The Ukrainian army said its units were battling hard to try to stop the Russians from gaining new ground, but has acknowledged that its troops face a difficult fight.

Russia, which has been trying to capture the city for more than a year, considers Pokrovsk as the gateway to its capture of the remaining 10 per cent of Ukraine's eastern industrial Donbas region, one of its key aims in the almost four-year war.

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