After more than three years of war, Russia controls about a fifth of Ukraine, from the border with Russia to occupied Crimea - including regions that are home to important industries, minerals and Europe’s largest nuclear power station.
Since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Russia has seized all of the Luhansk region, much of the Donetsk region, large parts of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions and small parts of the Kharkiv region and northern Sumy region, the launch point for Ukraine’s incursion into Russia’s Kursk region last year.
Ukraine seized about 1300sq km of Russian territory in the surprise assault, hoping to use it as a bargaining chip in potential peace talks, but now holds just 10sq km there.
Here’s what to know about the Ukrainian territory under Russian control.
Luhansk
Russia controls all of Luhansk, one of two oblasts, or regions, that make up the heavily industrialised Donbas area.
After failing to take Kyiv in the early weeks of the invasion, the Kremlin quickly pivoted its forces to Luhansk, which includes the strategic cities of Severodonetsk on the Donets River and Lysychansk, which Russian forces claimed control of in 2022.
Severodonetsk is home to the Azot chemical plant, one of Ukraine’s largest manufacturers of nitrogen fertilisers.
The region is also an important producer of metals, including copper and zinc, according to the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War.
Donetsk
The institute estimates that Moscow has seized all but a quarter of the Donetsk region and surrendering it ahead of any ceasefire deal with no commitment from Russia to end the war “would position Russian forces extremely well to renew their attacks on much more favourable terms”.
A defensive line in the region known as Ukraine’s “fortress belt” has hindered Russia’s territorial advances, according to the ISW, and remains a “significant obstacle to Russia’s current path of advance westward”.
Months after launching his invasion, Putin illegally proclaimed the annexation of Donetsk and three other Ukrainian regions - despite not having conquered any of them.
Some occupied parts of Donetsk have recently faced acute water shortages, causing embarrassment amid Moscow’s massive propaganda and reconstruction efforts designed to prevent the region’s restoration to Ukraine, the Washington Post reported.
Kherson
The southern Kherson region has been a key target for Russia, forming the last component of a “land bridge” to Crimea that Moscow has long coveted.
In December, the Institute for the Study of War estimated that Russia held 73% of the Kherson region.
In November 2022, Ukrainian forces liberated the city of Kherson after more than eight months of occupation. But Russia has persistently targeted it.
In June 2023, Russia and Ukraine traded blame for the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam, a mammoth Soviet-era structure that had been in Russian hands since the year before and supplied water to much of southern Ukraine.
Russia seized the canal in February 2023 to restore water flows to the Crimean Peninsula - cut off by Ukraine following its occupation in 2014.
Zaporizhzhia
The Zaporizhzhia region is home to Europe’s largest nuclear power station, which supplied 20% of Ukraine’s electricity before Russia’s 2022 invasion.
Russia captured the plant in the town of Enerhodar early on, and both sides have regularly accused each other of carrying out attacks that threaten its safety.
In March, Zelenskyy pushed back on a Trump proposal for the US to take over the facility.
Russia’s occupation of the plant deprives Ukraine of the energy it provided, and limited reserves of electricity are used to keep the reactors cool and avoid a nuclear disaster.
