Ukraine-Russia war map: Where are Putin’s forces making gains on the frontline as 2025 begins?

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By the time February 2025 arrives, marking three years since Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the situation on the front line could look very different.

Currently, Russian forces are advancing in the east, slowly but surely, and they are shrinking Ukraine’s partial hold of the border region of Kursk.

That the Russians haven’t been more successful is a testament, above all else, to the resilience of Ukraine’s troops on the ground, many of whom have been fighting continuously for years. Dysfunction in the Russian military, with Mr Putin as its de facto commander-in-chief, is another.

But US President Joe Biden sent the final military package of his mandate to Ukraine, becoming (for now) kyiv’s top, heavily armed ally. US President-elect Donald Trump will soon return to the White House with a promise to end the fighting, even if that means potentially rewarding Putin for his illegal land grab.

Every inch of territory lost or gained can be important in long-term negotiations. Next, we take a look at the existing hot spots of the roughly 640-mile front line.

Ukraine captured part of Russia’s Kursk border region after a bold cross-border attack in August. Since then, they have retained part of this territory, although the advance of Russian forces reduces Ukrainian dominance.

Senior Ukrainian official Mykhailo Podolyak revealed to The Independent a week after the attack that the attack was a “military tool of coercion aimed at forcing Russia to participate in the negotiation process. “

kyiv hopes that what remains of the territory captured in Kursk when Trump returns will prove important in any imaginable negotiations.

Recently, Russian forces have leaned more toward infantry-led attacks in the region, after tending to rely on mechanized strikes and heavy vehicle assistance in their initial attempts to control territory. Ukrainian.

Casualties are high. Bolstered by between 10,000 and 12,000 North Korean troops, however, they have continued to squeeze Ukraine’s perimeter. North Korea’s forces, for their part, have already suffered upwards of 1,000 casualties, according to Ukraine, the US and South Korea.

Russia has focused on the northwest side of Ukraine’s attack, as well as southeastern Sudzha, the main city controlled by Kyiv’s troops in Kursk, on the other side of the attack.

Russian forces launch attacks north of the city of Kupyansk in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region, but months go by without a major breakthrough.

Recently, according to the Centre for Defence Strategies (CDS), a Ukrainian security think tank, the Russians were also “forced to retreat from the northeastern outskirts of Kupyansk to fortified positions” around the nearby village of Petropavlivka.

However, in an expanding offensive to the south, they captured several villages, the largest of which is Lozova, consisting of about fifteen houses. It fell two weeks after the Russians surrounded it on three sides.

Ukraine and Russia have been fighting in the streets of Chasiv Yar, a city in the Donetsk region, since July, when Kyiv’s troops withdrew from the eastern Kanal neighbourhood, establishing the waterway there as the new front line.

Despite fears, at the time, that this could lead to the fall of the strategically valuable Chasiv Yar, which sits on high ground, Russian forces have yet to stage a significant breakthrough.

Viktor Trehubov, a spokesman for Ukrainian forces fighting in the area, said on Dec. 30 that Russian forces were seeking to attack the refractory plant in the middle of Chasiv Yar, a key Ukrainian defensive position in the settlement. However, he added that Ukrainian forces will continue to the facility.

The Russians are advancing through the center of Toretsk, the city of Donetsk, but they have been in the hands of Ukrainian forces for months, some of whom have defended this domain for years.

Trehubov said on December 29 that that street continued in Toretsk.

He added that lightly armoured Russian forces have been spotted picking up anti-tank mines and then throwing them at buildings in the Toretsk direction.

This appears to be the ultimate objective of the Russian forces advancing in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. Sitting on logistical routes connecting the rest of the region, Pokrovsk is a linchpin of Donetsk’s defence.

Since the Russian capture of the city of Avdiivka in February, Moscow’s troops have advanced around 30 miles to the outskirts of Pokrovsk, seizing around 400 square miles of the region in the process. That advance looks like a swollen bulge protruding from the front line.

Their good fortune heading towards Pokrovsk is evident as Russian forces advance towards the western outskirts of the city. As at Kursk, they appear to have resorted to small infantry attacks after months of costly mechanized attacks. Ukraine estimates that Russian vehicle losses in this domain alone have exceeded 2,000 in recent months, including tanks and armored personnel carriers.

“The situation of Ukrainian Defense Forces continues to deteriorate,” writes CDS. “The enemy is gradually expanding its penetration south of Pokrovsk.”

Senior Ukrainian officers have blamed the “disastrous” defence of the Pokrovsk area partially on poor management and communication between generals and those fighting on the ground.

kyiv hopes to resolve this in 2025, by appointing a new commander of the grassroots forces.

In his latest update, Ukraine’s military chief Oleksandr Syrskyi described the fighting in Pokrovsk as the “hottest” of the roughly 640-mile front line. Russia is suffering high casualties, he added, as it carries out “continuous meaty assaults”.

About 24 km southwest of Pokrovsk is Kurakhove. It’s in the lower left corner of Russia’s big attack on Pokrovsk.

Russian forces have had good luck in this area, advancing along the northern outskirts of Kurakhove along the Vovcha reservoir. They reached the outskirts of Shevchenko village, beyond the reservoir and Kurakhove, according to DeepState, a Ukrainian war observer with close ties to the military.

Meanwhile, some Ukrainian troops withdrew several kilometers from Kurakhove, around Shevchenko, to protect the advancing Russian forces. However, fighting continues inside Kurakhove.

After the capture of the town of Vuhledar in October, Russian forces deployed about 19 miles in the direction of Velyka Novosilka, a town near Donetsk’s border with the Zaporizhzhia region.

The city served as a key domain for offensive and defensive operations in the region, says Frontelligence Insight, a Ukrainian war monitor. It is also a key direction connecting cities further east to the rest of unoccupied Ukraine.

Its capture could provide Russia with “multiple features to achieve additional advances,” the organization added.

Velyka Novosilka is almost surrounded by Russian forces on the 3rd.

Most of the recent Russian attacks have been on the western flank of Velyka Novosilka, although Moscow’s troops have also advanced towards the town of Novyi Komar, both to the east and from the south.

A representative of a Ukrainian brigade operating near Velyka Novosilka said that Russian forces are attempting to bypass and seize Velyka Novosilka to reach the junction of the three regions of Donetsk, Zaporizhia, and Dnipropetrovsk.

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