Russia had reportedly evacuated 76,000 people from Kursk as Ukrainian forces continued to hold a swath of the Russian border region, while Ukraine had evacuated 20,000 people from the Sumy region, across the border from Kursk, due to fears of reprisal attacks.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged for the first time on Saturday that the nation’s forces were fighting in Russia’s Kursk region and said the operation was part of Kyiv’s drive to restore justice after Russia’s 2022 invasion.
Russia said Ukrainian forces had pushed into Kursk region last Tuesday and Russian military bloggers have acknowledged they made some headway, while saying the situation had since stabilised.
Zelensky had previously stayed silent about the operation.
In his nightly video address, the president said he had discussed the operation with top Ukrainian commander Oleksandr Syrskyi, while not forgetting the battles troops faced on the difficult eastern front.
“Today, I received several reports from commander-in-chief Syrskyi regarding the front lines and our actions to push the war onto the aggressor’s territory,” he said.
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“I am grateful to every unit of the defence forces for ensuring that. Ukraine is proving that it can indeed restore justice and ensure the necessary pressure on the aggressor.”
Zelensky had previously alluded to the operation, praising the military’s ability “to surprise” and thanking them for taking Russian soldiers prisoner, to be used in future negotiations, specifically referring to the past week.
In paying tribute to Ukrainian forces along the 1000-kilometre front line, Zelenskiy made special mention of actions in the northern Sumy region, across the border from Russia’s Kursk region.
Russia has stepped up its attacks of guided bombs and other aerial strikes in Sumy, prompting mass evacuations.
Russia-allied Belarus has sent more troops to reinforce its border with Ukraine, saying Ukrainian drones had violated its airspace in the course of the incursion into Kursk.
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Belarus’ Foreign Ministry summoned Ukraine’s charge d’affaires, demanded measures to ensure such incidents would not recur and suggested a repeat would prompt Belarus to consider whether Kyiv’s diplomatic presence in Minsk was “appropriate”.
President Alexander Lukashenko, addressing a meeting in eastern Belarus, said air defence forces on Friday destroyed several of “about a dozen” Ukrainian drones after they had violated Belarusian airspace in the Mogilev region bordering Russia.
Lukashenko, one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest allies, said others were later destroyed near the Russian city of Yaroslavl.
“I don’t understand why Ukraine had to do this. We have to look into it,” the BelTA news agency quoted him as saying. “But we have … made ourselves clear and conveyed to them that any provocation will not go unanswered.”
Reuters
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