KYIV - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday warned that the situation around the frontline hotspot of Bakhmut was getting increasingly difficult.

“The situation is getting more and more complicated,” Mr Zelensky said in his evening address.

“The enemy is constantly destroying everything that can be used to protect our positions,” he said, calling Ukrainian soldiers fighting for Bakhmut “real heroes”.

The fierce fighting for the industrial city of Bakhmut in the eastern region of Donetsk has been the longest-running battle of Russia’s year-long invasion.

Mr Zelensky has said Ukrainians will fight for Bakhmut for as long as they can.

Taking Bakhmut would be a major win for Moscow, but analysts say its capture would be mainly symbolic, as the salt-mining town holds little strategic value.

Speaking in remarks broadcast on Russian television on Monday, Mr Denis Pushilin, the leader of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, said that all roads leading into Bakhmut were “under fire control” of the pro-Moscow forces. AFP