“The situation in the Belgorod region remains extremely difficult and tense,” said Vyacheslav Gladkov in a video message on the short message service Telegram on Wednesday. He reported daily shelling by the Ukrainian armed forces, which destroyed houses and killed and injured civilians.
Due to this situation, it was decided to impose a regional state of emergency over the entire Belgorod region with immediate effect, “… with a subsequent appeal to the government to declare a federal state of emergency.” The measures were intended to ensure the safety of the population and to deal with the consequences of the attacks.
Selenskyj sees his armed forces on the rise
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky believes his country’s armed forces are on the rise in view of the advance in Russian territory. “Ukraine can achieve its goals, defend its interests and protect its independence,” Zelensky said in his evening video message broadcast in Kiev. The Ukrainian army has now captured 74 towns in the Kursk region – twice as many as the Russian side claims. Neither of these figures can be verified.
According to the acting governor of the Kursk region, Alexei Smirnov, 28 localities are under enemy control. The Ukrainian project DeepState assumes that about 44 Russian localities are under the control of Kyiv.
In a conversation with Zelensky, Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksander Syrsky reported that his own troops had advanced between one and three kilometers in some directions. According to this, the Ukrainian armed forces had captured an additional 40 square kilometers in the Kursk region.
1000 square kilometers of area occupied
Syrskyj had previously reported that an area of around 1,000 square kilometers had been captured since the offensive began on Tuesday a week ago. That would be more than double the area that the Russian army claims to have captured in the fighting in eastern Ukraine since the beginning of the year. These figures could not be independently verified either.
During a meeting with Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin on Monday, Smirnov said that the Ukrainian armed forces had penetrated up to 12 kilometers deep into the Kursk region, stretching 40 kilometers along the border. Ukrainian sources spoke of a depth of about 30 kilometers.
According to Zelensky, Ukraine is pursuing several goals with the unprecedented ground offensive on Russian territory. The invasion of his troops is primarily intended to increase the pressure on Moscow to enter into peace negotiations after almost two and a half wars of aggression against Ukraine. Zelensky said that this would bring a just peace closer.
Bargain
Kiev can use the conquered areas as a bargaining chip in negotiations because it wants to get back the areas occupied by Russian troops in the east and south of Ukraine. The Foreign Ministry in Kiev had stressed that, unlike Russia, the Ukrainian side is not annexing foreign territory.
Zelensky also made it clear that he needed the new Russian prisoners of war to exchange them for Ukrainians. Hundreds of Russians have already been taken prisoner by the Ukrainians. They are being treated more humanely than in the Russian army, said Zelensky, who appeared smiling and more relaxed than he has for months during appearances in Kyiv. Kyiv and Moscow have already exchanged prisoners several times.
Zelensky again praised the Ukrainian soldiers who invaded Russia and ordered that they receive their money and everything they need properly. “We all now need the same unity and effectiveness that we showed in the first weeks and months of this war, when Ukraine took the initiative and began to turn the tide in its favor,” the president said. With the invasion of Kursk, the country has once again proven what it is capable of.
Heavy fighting in Kursk
A senior US government official commented on possible reasons for the Ukrainian advance in the Russian region of Kursk. With this cross-border operation, Ukraine appears to want to force Russia to withdraw its troops from Ukraine, the insider told the Reuters news agency. Due to the advance of the Ukrainian armed forces, Russia now has to defend its own territory against the attack. This could lead to a weakening of the Russian armed forces within Ukraine, according to the assessment from Washington.
In the Kursk region, the authorities continued evacuations amid ongoing heavy fighting. Tens of thousands of people had to leave their homes to seek safety. According to official figures, twelve civilians have been killed so far. More than 120 people have been injured.
Acting governor Smirnov encouraged the people and pointed out that 81 years ago in the Second World War, the Red Army defeated the major offensive of Nazi Germany under dictator Adolf Hitler in the famous Battle of Kursk. It was considered the largest tank battle in history. Russia will be victorious again this time, said Smirnov. He also thanked the regions of Russia from which more and more humanitarian aid is coming.
Russian military bloggers reported that the Ukrainian armed forces continued their attempts to advance northwards towards Kurchatov, using air strikes to do so, reported the Rybar channel on Telegram. Attacks by the Ukrainian armed forces were repelled in the Korenevo district; however, south-west of the town of Sudzha, Russian troops lost control in the town of Plekhovo. The Russian Ministry of Defense made – also unverifiable – statements that the army was continuing to repel attempts by the Ukrainian armed forces to advance deeper into the Kursk region.
