President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine was reaching its “strategic goal” in Kursk during his nightly address to the nation.
Ukraine claims its forces have advanced further into Russia’s Kursk region, gaining more ground and capturing more Russian prisoners.
The forces also said they destroyed a Russian Su-34 strike jet, used to launch glide bombs at Ukrainian front-line positions and cities, when they attacked the region’s military airfields.
Commander of the Ukrainian military, General Oleksandr Syrskyi, informed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that assault troops advanced one to two kilometres further into more areas of Kursk and took more than 100 Russian soldiers prisoner.
Zelenskyy said the prisoners would eventually be swapped for Ukrainian prisoners of war.
“Our advance in the Kursk region is going well today, we are reaching our strategic goal. We have significantly increased the ‘exchange fund’ for our country,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address.
The Ukrainian president also took the opportunity to call on Western allies for more weaponry.
“Our Ukrainian drones work exactly as they should. But there are things that can’t be done with drones alone, unfortunately,” he said. “We need other weapons — missile weapons. And we continue working with our partners on long-standing decisions for Ukraine because these are forward-looking decisions for our victory.”
“It has to be done. The bolder our partners’ decisions are, the less Putin will be able to do”, he added.
Russian officials say roughly 121,000 people have been evacuated from Kursk since Ukraine began its surprise cross-border offensive on 6 August.
Russia’s Belgorod border region, which is next to Kursk, declared a regional emergency on Wednesday during heavy Ukrainian shelling and a federal emergency was declared in Kursk on Saturday.
Changing the landscape of the battlefield
Ukraine’s decision to push into Russia has sent shockwaves through the Kremlin and changed the landscape of the battlefield.
As the offensive enters its second week, Ukrainian forces are pushing out in several directions from the Russian town of Sudzha.
Within a week, Ukraine claimed to have captured almost as much Russian land in Kursk as Russian forces took in Ukraine in the last seven months, according to the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank.
Russian forces are still scrambling to respond, but the move has also exposed Ukraine’s own weaknesses by extending the front line and committing new troops at a time when military leaders are short on manpower.
Kyiv deployed battalions drawn from multiple brigades, some of which were pulled from the hottest parts of the front line, where Russia’s advance has continued unabated. So far, Moscow’s overall strategic advantage is intact.
ADVERTISEMENTRussian President Vladimir Putin claims the incursion is an attempt by Kyiv to stop Moscow’s offensive in the Donbas region and gain leverage in possible future peace talks.
Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak has also admitted that the incursion may strengthen Kyiv’s hand in future negotiations with Russia.
Occupying part of Russian territory ahead of any cease-fire talks may give Ukraine some leverage.
But a Ukrainian foreign ministry spokesman said the cross-border operation was mainly aimed at protecting Ukrainian land from long-range strikes launched from Kursk.
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