Russia’s forces have surrounded two-thirds of Sievierodonetsk in an attempt to encircle it but have yet to progress further than a hotel on its outskirts, where Ukrainian forces have inflicted heavy casualties, Haidai told Ukrainian television.

“They’re hiding-out there, but they can’t move forward,” he said…

Analysts at the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War said any Russian victory in Luhansk would probably be pyrrhic.

“Putin is now hurling men and munitions at the last remaining major population center [ . . . ] as if taking it would win the war for the Kremlin. He is wrong,” they wrote.

The brutal war of attrition had reduced Russia’s personnel and firepower so much, they added, that “regardless of which side holds the city, the Russian offensive at the operational and strategic levels will probably have culminated, giving Ukraine the chance to restart its operational-level counteroffensives to push Russian forces back.”