Ukraine hits back in Kursk region of western Russia

Russia said on Sunday that Ukraine had launched a counterattack in the Kursk region, an area of western Russia from which Russian troops have been trying to eject Ukrainian forces for the past five months.

Ukrainian troops broke across the border in a surprise incursion on August 6 and have managed to hold on to a chunk of territory there which could provide Kyiv with an important bargaining chip in potential peace talks.

“About 9am Moscow time (8am), to stop the advance of Russian troops in the Kursk direction, the enemy launched a counterattack with an assault group consisting of two tanks, a mine clearing vehicle, and twelve armoured combat vehicles with paratroops towards Berdin village,” the Russian defence ministry said.

“Artillery and aviation of the North group of [Russian] forces defeated the assault group of the Ukrainian Armed Forces,” it added.

The statement said two Ukrainian attacks had been repelled. Reuters could not independently verify the situation on the ground.

Reports from Russia’s influential war bloggers, who support Moscow’s war in Ukraine but have often reported critically on failings and setbacks, indicated that the latest Ukrainian assault had put Russian forces on the defensive.

“Despite strong pressure from the enemy, our units are heroically holding the line,” the Operativnye Svodki (Operational Reports) channel said.

It said artillery and small-arms battles were taking place, and Ukraine was using Western-armoured vehicles to bring in large numbers of infantry.

The accounts from the defence ministry and the bloggers said fighting was concentrated just north of a highway that runs from Sudzha, near the border, to Kursk, the regional capital.

But one influential blogger, Yuri Podolyak, said this was most likely a Ukrainian distraction manoeuvre, possibly to prepare a strike on Glushkovo, further west. He recommended civilians there and in another town, Korenevo, to evacuate.

Ukrainian and Western assessments say that some 11,000 troops from Russia’s ally North Korea have been deployed in the Kursk region to support Moscow’s forces. Russia has neither confirmed nor denied their presence.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Saturday that Russian and North Korean forces had suffered heavy losses.

“In battles yesterday and today near just one village, Makhnovka, in Kursk region, the Russian army lost up to a battalion of North Korean infantry soldiers and Russian paratroops,” Zelensky said. “This is significant.”

The president provided no specific details. A battalion can vary in size but is generally made up of several hundred troops.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said in response to a question at his marathon annual phone-in last month that Russia would definitely drive Ukrainian forces out of Kursk but declined to set a date for when this would happen.

Russia now controls about a fifth of Ukraine, but Ukraine’s unexpected success in biting off and retaining a slice of Russian territory could boost its negotiating position as both sides gear up for possible peace talks this year.

Both have been striving to improve their battlefield positions before US president-elect Donald Trump is sworn in on January 20. Trump has repeatedly said he will bring a quick end to the war, but without saying how.

By committing some of its most effective units to the Kursk offensive, Ukraine has, however, weakened the defence of its own eastern regions where Russian forces have advanced since August at their most rapid pace since 2022.

The Ukrainian military said on Saturday that the “hottest” front was near Pokrovsk, an important road and rail hub towards which Russia has been pressing for months.

On Sunday, Ukraine’s air defences shot down 61 out of 103 drones launched by Russia in an overnight attack, the air force said. Russia said it had destroyed five Ukrainian drones over Russian territory.

Reuters