Over 100,000 Kursk residents were displaced after Kyiv’s troops came over Russia’s western border in August.
Ukraine is reportedly losing ground in the Russian province of Kursk, with a senior Ukrainian military official saying over 40% of land seized has been lost.
Russia deployed tens of thousands of troops to Kursk after Kyiv’s forces launched their surprise incursion, surprising Moscow two and a half years into their full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
At the height of the incursion, Ukraine reportedly controlled up to 1,376 square kilometres, though sources in Kyiv’s military say this has now decreased to 800 square kilometres.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy commented on the situation in the region, saying the goal of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin is to push Ukrainian troops out of the area “by January 20th next year.”
“And all these stories, all these demonstrative strikes with new missiles, are not just for show. He has set this task,” he said.
During the statement, Zelenskyy also said that generals of the Ukrainian army must be in the trenches with soldiers to boost morale.
“For me, a general who has not been in a trench is not a general, despite his experience. With all due respect, today the most difficult situation is on the front line, in the trench,” said Zelenskyy.
Authorities said more than 120,000 civilians were evacuated after Ukraine’s incursion into the region in August.
The strike came as a shock to most, with Kyiv’s forces seizing several villages and taking hundreds of prisoners in the largest attack on Russia since World War II.
This past week has seen the most significant escalation in hostilities that Ukraine has witnessed since Russia’s full-scale invasion and marks a new chapter in the nearly three-year war — one tinged with uncertainty and fear.
It began with US President Joe Biden reversing a longstanding policy by granting Kyiv permission to deploy American longer-range missiles inside Russian territory, which was immediately followed by Moscow striking Ukraine with a new experimental ballistic weapon that has alarmed the international community and heightened fears of further escalation.