Zelensky says Russian and North Korean troops suffered vital losses in Kursk | EUROtoday

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Russian and North Korean forces suffered “significant” losses in intense preventing in Russia’s southern Kursk area, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has mentioned.

Speaking throughout his nightly video deal with on Saturday, Mr Zelensky cited experiences from prime Ukrainian commander Oleksandr Syrskyi, saying battles close to the village of Makhnovka, near the Ukrainian border, resulted within the lack of as much as a battalion of Russian paratroopers and North Korean infantry troops.

“This is significant,” Mr Zelensky mentioned, with out offering additional particulars. A battalion sometimes contains a number of hundred troopers. However, the claims couldn’t be independently verified.

Ukrainian and Western assessments counsel that round 11,000 North Korean troops are stationed within the Kursk area, the place Ukrainian forces have occupied swathes of territory following a mass cross-border incursion in August.

Mr Zelensky beforehand reported heavy North Korean losses within the space and accused Russian forces of failing to adequately defend their North Korean counterparts. He additionally alleged that North Koreans have been being executed by their very own commanders to forestall give up.

He mentioned the continued “fierce battles” alongside your entire 1,000km-frontline, describing the state of affairs close to the jap Ukrainian metropolis of Pokrovsk as notably tough. “Russian forces continue to expend vast numbers of their own personnel in assaults,” he mentioned.

A Ukrainian navy spokesperson earlier mentioned that Pokrovsk stays the “hottest” frontline sector. Russian troops have reportedly launched contemporary assaults in an effort to bypass the town from the south and sever provide traces to Ukrainian defenders.

Pokrovsk, a strategic logistics hub and a key provider of coking coal for Ukraine’s metal business, had a pre-war inhabitants of 60,000, of whom round 11,000 stay.

Ukraine’s air defenses intercepted 61 of 103 drones launched by Russia in an in a single day assault on Sunday. The air pressure reported that a further 42 drones have been “lost” resulting from digital countermeasures. There have been no rapid experiences of main harm or casualties.

Russian aviation watchdog Rosaviatsia quickly suspended flights at a number of airports in central Russia on Sunday morning, citing security issues. Operations resumed by noon, however the closures adopted current Ukrainian drone strikes within the area, together with a December 21 assault on Kazan.

In Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy area, a Russian guided bomb assault on Saturday injured 10 folks, together with two youngsters, and brought on intensive harm within the village of Svesa. Mr Zelensky shared video footage of rescue operations and described the destruction of a whole block of a residential constructing. Similar strikes hit neighboring Kharkiv area, underscoring the continued toll of Russia’s full-scale invasion, which started in February 2022.

Both sides have continued to trade heavy blows because the struggle grinds into its fourth 12 months.