British military experts say the Bakhmutka River and a strip of open land near its banks are now a “kill zone” for Wagner’s forces trying to advance on the western side of the Bakhmut.

What the British Ministry of Defense says in this morning’s assessment:

• Over the past four days, the forces of the “Wagner” PMC have taken control of the easternmost part of Donbas – the city of Bakhmut. In the center of the city, the Bakhmutka River now crosses the front line.
• Ukrainian forces control the western part of the city and have destroyed key bridges across the river, which runs north-south across a 200- to 800-meter-wide strip of open land between built-up areas.
• With Ukrainian units able to fire from the fortified buildings to the west, the area has become a veritable kill zone (the “kill zone”), which is likely to pose a serious challenge to Wagner’s forces as they attempt to continue their frontal advance to the west.
• However, Ukrainian forces and their supply lines in the west remain vulnerable to Russian attempts to attack their flanks from the north and south.

Ukraine decided to stay in Bakhmut and continue to fight for this city because it is squeezing the best Russian units there and humiliating them before the spring counteroffensive, Zelensky’s senior adviser Mykhailo Podolyak explained on Friday.

“Russia has concentrated in Bakhmut a significant part of its trained military personnel, the remnants of its professional army, as well as private (hiring) companies,” he said.

“Therefore we have two objectives: to reduce their competent personnel as much as possible and to pin them down in a few key battles of attrition to interrupt their advance and focus our resources elsewhere for the spring counteroffensive. So, at this stage, Bakhmut acts to the full, even surpasses his main roles,” Podolyak added.