Ukraine has deployed special forces from the Defence Intelligence directorate (HUR) to the embattled city of Pokrovsk in Donetsk region, in an operation intended to stabilise the front after Russian units pushed into the urban perimeter earlier this month.

The insertion took place earlier this week amid intensified Russian pressure on the city, a key logistics hub for Ukrainian forces in the east. The mission formed part of a broader effort to reinforce threatened sectors as fighting shifted deeper into the urban area.

Based on Ukrainian military sources, the contingent arrived by UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter and was tasked to operate in the eastern parts of Pokrovsk where Russian probing attacks and infiltration have increased. The operation was complicated by Russian drone activity. A video circulating online appears to show at least ten personnel dismounting from a helicopter into a field.

The mission was described by the same sources as being overseen by HUR chief Kyrylo Budanov. While Kyiv has not formally announced the deployment, the report aligns with concurrent battlefield assessments that Ukraine is moving limited high-readiness assets to hold critical ground and keep supply routes open into the Pokrovsk agglomeration.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said this week that Russia has concentrated about 170,000 personnel in the Donetsk sector, with Pokrovsk a primary axis of effort. He described the situation as “difficult”, while Ukrainian commanders emphasised the need to strengthen defensive lines and maintain access to vital roads feeding the city. Independent reporting has echoed those assessments, noting sustained Russian pressure and creeping advances around approaches to the urban area.

Open-source monitoring indicates that Russian troops have used infiltration tactics to establish a presence inside parts of Pokrovsk. The Ukrainian OSINT project DeepState has tracked a gradual increase in Russian infantry activity and sabotage-reconnaissance operations within the city. The Institute for the Study of War has similarly cited Ukrainian General Staff reports that several hundred Russian troops were operating inside Pokrovsk, underscoring the fluid nature of the front and the challenge of urban combat against small, dispersed groups. Pravda+1

Pokrovsk’s significance is primarily logistical. It sits on road and rail nodes that connect Ukrainian positions across central Donetsk region; its loss would complicate resupply and lateral movement for Kyiv’s forces, and could open opportunities for Russia to expand control westward. Reuters has outlined Ukrainian efforts over recent days to bolster the city’s defences as Russian assaults intensified, including the movement of reserves and engineering assets to reinforce positions and counter the risk of encirclement.

Russian authorities have claimed momentum in the sector, including assertions of Ukrainian forces being surrounded in the area, though these statements have not been independently verified. Kyiv has rejected assertions of a completed encirclement while acknowledging that Russian units have breached outer lines and that localised street fighting is occurring. In this context, the insertion of HUR special forces appears designed to stiffen the defence at short notice, conduct targeted raids, and disrupt Russian reconnaissance and drone operators around key approach routes.

The immediate effect of the HUR deployment remains unclear. With drone surveillance dense on both sides and artillery duels ongoing around the city’s edges, the battle for Pokrovsk is likely to hinge on whether Ukraine can keep ground lines of communication open while blunting further Russian infiltration. What is evident from multiple independent accounts is that the fight has entered a more precarious phase, with urban terrain, contested supply corridors, and limited reserves all shaping a campaign that Kyiv is now reinforcing with elite assets.