KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine’s top military commander says his forces now control 1,000 square kilometers (386 square miles) of Russia’s neighboring Kursk region, the first time a Ukrainian military official has commented publicly on the gains of the lightning incursion. Embarrassed the Kremlin.
Gen. Oleksandr Chirsky made the statement in a video posted Monday to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s Telegram channel. In that video, he explained the front line situation to the President.
“The troops are carrying out their tasks. The fighting continues on the entire front line. The situation is under our control,” said Chirsky.
Russian forces are still struggling to retaliate Ukraine attack shock After almost a week of fierce fighting.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said it was Kiev’s effort to stop the incursion, which has led to the fleeing of more than 100,000 civilians. Attack of Moscow In the Donbass region of eastern Ukraine, it may influence future peace talks.
Zelenskyy confirmed for the first time that the Ukrainian army was inside the Kursk region. In the telegram, he praised his country’s soldiers and commanders for “their determination and decisive actions”. He did not elaborate.
The Ukrainian operation is under tight secrecy and its goals are unclear. The A stunning maneuver It pitted the Kremlin’s forces against Russia’s counter-terrorism forces Unrelenting effort to punch through Ukrainian defenses at selected points on the front line in eastern Ukraine in recent months.
Speaking at a meeting with top security and defense officials on Monday, Putin appeared to be reflecting Kiev’s attempt to reach a better negotiating position in future talks that could end the offensive that began on August 6. War. He insisted that Moscow’s army would win.
Putin said Ukraine may have hoped the attack would cause public unrest in Russia, but failed to do so, and that the attack had led to an increase in volunteers to join the Russian military. He said Russian forces would continue their offensive in eastern Ukraine regardless.
AP Washington correspondent Sagar Meghani reports that Ukraine’s top military commander now controls nearly 400 square miles of Russian territory after a lightning incursion that embarrassed Moscow.
“It is obvious that the enemies will try to destabilize the situation in the border zone to destabilize the domestic political situation in our country,” Putin said. Russia’s main task is “to expel the enemy from our territories and, together with the border service, ensure reliable security of the state border.”
Ukrainian forces have pushed a 40-kilometer (25-mile) front into the Kursk region by 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) and now control 28 Russian settlements, acting Kursk governor Alexei Smirnov told Putin.
Smirnov said 12 civilians were killed and 121 injured, including 10 children. About 121,000 people have either been displaced or have fled fighting-affected areas on their own, he said.
Smirnov said it was difficult to track all Ukrainian units roaming the region and create diversions, noting that some were using fake Russian IDs.
The governor of Belgorod region near Kursk also announced the evacuation of people from a district near the Ukrainian border.
Zelensky said the area now controlled by Ukrainian forces had been used several times to attack Ukraine’s Sumy region, adding that it was “absolutely justified to destroy Russian terrorists where they are.”
“Russia brought war to others. Now it’s coming home,” he said in a video posted on Telegram.
Russia had seen previous incursions into its territory during the nearly 2 1/2-year war, but the incursion into the Kursk region marked the largest offensive on its soil since World War II, marking a milestone in the war. It was the first time the Ukrainian military led the incursion ahead of Ukrainian-backed Russian militias.
The development was a blow to Putin’s efforts to ensure that life in Russia was largely unaffected by the war. State propaganda tried to play down the attack, emphasizing the efforts of the authorities to help the residents of the region and trying to divert the attention of the army, which had prepared for the attack and failed to quickly repel it.
Kursk residents recorded videos begging Putin to leave their belongings behind and leave the border area. But Russia’s state-controlled media kept a tight lid on any expression of discontent.
Retired general Andrey Kurulev, a member of the lower house of the Russian parliament, criticized the military’s failure to secure the border.
“Unfortunately, the group of border guarding forces does not have its own intelligence assets,” he said on his messaging app channel. “No one likes to see the truth in reports, everyone likes to hear that it’s good.”
It again raised the question within Russia of whether Ukraine was using weapons provided by NATO members. Some Western countries have blocked allowing Ukraine to use their military aid to attack Russian soil, fearing it would trigger an escalation that would drag Russia and NATO into war.
While it is unclear what weapons Ukraine is using along the border, Russian media have widely reported the presence of American Bradley and German Mortar armored personnel carriers. The claim could not be independently verified.
Ukraine already used US weapons to attack inside Russia.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said in an interview published Monday that weapons provided by his country “cannot be used to attack Russia on its territory.”
Meanwhile, German Defense Ministry spokesman Arne Collatz said on Monday that legal experts agree, “International law allows a self-defending state to defend itself in the territory of an aggressor. This is clear from our point of view.”
Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Monday that reinforcements sent to the area, backed by air forces and artillery, had repelled seven attacks by Ukrainian units near Martynovka, Borki and Korenevo in the previous 24 hours.
Russian forces also thwarted an attempt by Ukrainian mobile groups to penetrate deep into Russian territory near Gauchuk, the ministry said.
Pasi Paroinen, an analyst at the Blackbird Group, an open-source intelligence agency that monitors the war in Finland, said the hardest phase of Ukraine’s incursion is likely to begin now as Russian reserves enter the field.
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