Kiev launches new Kursk offensive – DW – 01/05/2025

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he would again urge allies to increase their contribution to Ukraine’s air defense at an upcoming meeting in Germany.

Zelensky said the countries attending the so-called Ramstein Group meeting at the US Ramstein Air Base in Germany on Thursday will include those who want to help enhance our capabilities not only against missiles but also against guided bombs and Russian aviation. Can.

This meeting is taking place a few weeks before America’s newly elected President Donald Trump takes charge at the White House. During the election campaign, Trump said he would soon end the nearly three-year war in Ukraine, but he never discussed how.

In his last few weeks in office, US President Joe Biden has worked to send as much military aid as possible to Ukraine before Trump is sworn in on January 20. The US is, by far, Ukraine’s largest military supporter.

According to media reports from Kiev, Russia annexed about 3,600 square kilometers (1,390 square miles) of Ukrainian territory last year – an area roughly the size of the Mediterranean island of Majorca or New York’s Long Island.

Ukraine suffered its largest territorial loss in November, losing 610 square kilometers as the Russians annexed about 20 square kilometers on a daily basis, the military blog Militarny reported.

It cited map data from another military blog, DeepStateMAP.

Regional losses in 2024 were reportedly several times greater than in 2023, although there was no official confirmation of the figures.

Moscow appears to have confirmed that Ukraine has launched a “retaliatory strike” in Russia’s western border region of Kursk.

This is the area where Kiev’s forces launched a ground offensive last August.

Pro-Kremlin military bloggers had earlier reported that a powerful new offensive was underway.

“At about 9 a.m. Moscow time (0600 GMT/UTC), the enemy launched a counter-offensive to stop the advance of Russian troops in the Kursk direction,” the Russian Defense Ministry said.

The ministry said Ukraine had used two tanks, a dozen armored vehicles and a demolition unit in the new attack.

It said that the soldiers were heading towards Bardin village.

“The campaign to destroy Ukrainian military structures continues,” the ministry said.

Kiev says Ukrainian forces have launched a new offensive following a surprise incursion into the western Russian region of Kursk in August.

“Kursk region, good news: Russia is getting what it deserves,” Andrey Yermak, head of the Ukrainian presidential office, wrote on Telegram.

His comments appeared to confirm reports from military bloggers that new advances were being made at Kursk.

Andrey Kovalenko, head of the counter-disinformation center at the National Security and Defense Council, which reports to the Ukrainian president, said the Russians were surprised by the attacks being carried out by Ukrainian forces from multiple directions in the Kursk region.

Although the military initially provided no information about the attacks, the main target appeared to be the road to Kursk, northeast of the small Ukrainian-controlled town of Sudzha.

Video from the area reportedly shows several detachments of Ukrainian armored vehicles moving at high speed, with demining vehicles at the forefront.

Reports from influential war bloggers indicate Moscow’s forces are on the defensive in a new Ukrainian offensive in Russia’s Kursk region.

Russian bloggers support the war in Ukraine but often report criticism over shortcomings.

“Despite heavy enemy pressure, our units heroically hold the line,” Operative Svodki. [Operational Reports] The channel said.

The channel said artillery and small arms fighting was taking place, with Ukraine using Western armored vehicles to bring in large numbers of infantry.

Bloggers said the fighting was concentrated just north of the highway from the border town of Sudza to the Russian region’s capital, Kursk.

Yuri Podolyak, an influential blogger, said that the attack was probably a Ukrainian distraction maneuver, possibly to attack Glushkovo in the west.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has reported heavy losses of Russian units trying to recapture the Kursk region.

“In today’s and yesterday’s fighting around the Makhnivka settlement in the Kursk region, the Russian army has lost an infantry battalion of North Korean soldiers and Russian paratroopers,” Zelensky said in his nightly video message to the nation.

The reports were not independently verifiable. A battalion of the Russian army officially consists of up to 500 people.

Recently, videos have repeatedly surfaced showing attempts by Russian units, sometimes reinforced by North Korean troops, to storm the Kursk region.

rc/sms (AFP, AP, dpa, Reuters)