New Delhi, Nov. 1 -- Russia has deployed around 170,000 troops in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region where they are trying to capture the stronghold of Pokrovsk in a major push for a battlefield victory, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday.

"The situation in Pokrovsk is difficult," Zelenskyy said, while also rejecting recent Russian claims that the devastated city is surrounded after more than a year of fighting. He acknowledged that some Russian units had infiltrated the city, but insisted that Ukrainian defenders are weeding them out.

"There are Russians in Pokrovsk," Zelenskyy told a media briefing in Kyiv. "They are being destroyed, gradually destroyed, because, well, we need to preserve our personnel."

In previous si...