Death toll rises as Russia battles incursion from Ukraine
Fighting in Russia’s Kursk region entered a second day following what officials in Moscow called an incursion involving hundreds of Ukrainian troops, turning President Vladimir Putin’s invasion back onto his own territory.
Shelling continues in the region, where at least five people have been killed and 28 wounded in the attacks, Russia’s state-run Tass news service reported Wednesday. Acting Kursk Governor Alexey Smirnov said on Telegram that a Ukrainian drone struck an ambulance, killing the driver and a paramedic, adding that regional air defenses intercepted four missiles and three drones overnight.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said Tuesday that troops and border guards were fighting as many as 300 Ukrainian soldiers backed by 11 tanks and more than 20 other armored vehicles in the border region. Artillery and aircraft fired on the Ukrainian formations, and Russia called up reserves of troops to the region, according to the ministry’s Telegram channel.
The ministry initially declared that the Ukrainian troops had retreated back across the border after suffering “significant losses.” That information was later deleted from its statement, without explanation.
Russian military bloggers reported Wednesday on Telegram that Ukrainian troops continued to occupy several border villages and were advancing toward the town of Sudzha, which hosts a key gas metering station, where they were faced air and artillery attacks. Gazprom PJSC’s export gas flows via Sudzha toward Ukraine and on to Europe, which declined slightly Wednesday from previous days, continue normally, according to the Russian energy producer.
Ukrainian officials and the military haven’t publicly commented, while the General Staff press service didn’t return calls for comment.
Ukraine reported that its air defenses downed 30 Russian Shahed drones laden with explosives overnight. Russia continued attacks along the frontline and shelled border villages in Ukraine’s northerneast Sumy region, on the border with Kursk, and neighboring Chernihiv region, the general staff in Kyiv said.
Drone Damage
Officials in Russia’s southern city of Voronezh said Wednesday that 22 apartments, five other buildings and 38 vehicles were damaged by debris from downed Ukrainian drones, according to Tass.
As Ukraine continues to defend against the Russian invasion that’s now in its third year, it has been conducting strikes on Russian infrastructure and industrial facilities to try to undermine the Kremlin’s war machine.
Russia’s Belgorod and Kursk regions bordering Ukraine have faced repeated drone and missile attacks in the war. Units of anti-Kremlin Russian volunteers based in Ukraine have also staged cross-border raids.
The latest incursion doesn’t involve Ukraine-based Russian volunteers, the NV.ua news website said, citing an unidentified member of military intelligence.
Fighting in Ukraine has largely become deadlocked along a 790-mile front line in the east and southeast of the country, with neither side able to achieve significant territorial gains.