Russian Defence Ministry announces complete ‘liberation’ of Kursk from Ukrainian forces

Russia’s Defence Ministry announced the complete “liberation” of the country’s western Kursk region on Saturday, ending the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU)’s eight-month foothold on Russian territory.

During a video call with Vladimir Putin, Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Valery Gerasimov announced that the Russian military had expelled Ukrainian troops from the border village of Gornal, the final AFU-occupied settlement in the area, thereby completing the “defeat of the armed formations of the Armed Forces of Ukraine that invaded the Kursk region”.

“The Kiev regime’s plans to create a so-called strategic foothold and to disrupt our offensive in Donbas have failed”, Gerasimov told Putin.

In response, Putin claimed that the “huge losses” inflicted on the AFU by Russian forces would have an impact on the “entire line of contact” and help Russia push home its advantage elsewhere on the front line.

“The complete defeat of the enemy in the Kursk border area creates conditions for further successful actions by our troops in other important areas of the front and brings closer the defeat of the neo-Nazi regime”, Putin said.

The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, however, later dismissed the Kremlin’s claims as a “propaganda ploy and an attempt to pass wishful thinking off as reality”, stressing that Ukrainian units continued to fight in the region despite a “difficult” situation and that there was no threat of their encirclement by Russian forces.

During his call with Putin, Gerasimov also for the first time confirmed that North Korean soldiers were fighting alongside the Russian military, stating that they had provided “significant assistance” under a strategic partnership agreement signed between Moscow and Pyongyang last year, before praising their “fortitude, heroism and courage” as they fought “shoulder to shoulder” with Russian troops against the AFU in Kursk.

The announcement came a month after Putin ordered the region’s “full liberation” during a surprise visit to Kursk in March, when Russian troops recaptured Sudzha, the main town under Ukrainian control since the AFU launched its cross-border incursion in August.

Russian forces were now focused on creating a “security zone” in Ukraine’s eastern Sumy region, which borders Kursk, Gerasimov said.