Russia is fighting back major Ukrainian incursion By Reuters

By Guy Faulconbridge

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia was waging heavy fighting against thousands of Ukrainian troops up to 20 km (12 miles) deep inside the Kursk region on Saturday after Ukraine’s biggest attack on Russian sovereign territory since the war began in 2022 .

Ukrainian forces crossed the border with Russia early Tuesday and swept through parts of western Russia’s Kursk region, a surprise attack that could be aimed at gaining leverage in potential ceasefire talks after the US election.

Backed by swarms of drones and heavy artillery fire, Ukrainian units moved quickly to carve out a sliver of western Russian territory near the border, while sabotage units penetrated deeper into Russia, according to Russian war bloggers .

“The armed forces continue to repel the attempted invasion of the Ukrainian armed forces,” the Russian defense ministry said on Saturday, adding that intense fighting was centered around Malaya Loknya, Olgovka and Ivashkovskoye, settlements about 10-20 km inland Russia.

In a sign of the gravity of the situation, Russia on Saturday imposed an expanded security regime in three border regions, while Belarus said it had repelled what it believed to be a major drone attack from Ukraine.

President Vladimir Putin viewed the Ukrainian attack as a major provocation, and although Russia’s top general, Valery Gerasimov, said on Wednesday that Ukraine’s incursion had been halted, Russia has so far failed to push Ukrainian forces back across the border.

Russian military bloggers said on Saturday that the situation had stabilized after Russia rushed in forces to stop the surprise advance, although they said Ukraine was rapidly building up its forces.

The Ukrainian attack has some in Moscow wondering why Ukraine was able to break through the Kursk region so easily after more than two years of Europe’s most intense land war since World War II.

“A large-scale military operation is underway against a very serious enemy who are certainly not idiots,” said Yuri Podolyaka, a popular Ukrainian-born pro-Russian military blogger. He said the Russian air force saved the day by striking dozens of invading Ukrainian units, but also said the truth must be told about the gravity of the situation.

US SUPPORT

The battles around Sudzha come at a crucial time in the war: Kiev is worried that US support could weaken if Republican Donald Trump wins the presidential election in November.

Trump has said he will end the war, and both Russia and Ukraine are eager to gain the strongest possible negotiating position on the battlefield.

Ukraine wants to contain Russian forces, which control 18 percent of its territory, while showing the West that it can still mount major military operations that have hurt Russia, even if the Kursk front is unlikely to change the outcome of the war.

Ukraine did not directly comment on the attack, but a video posted on Ukrainian media purported to show Ukrainian soldiers controlling a gas-measuring facility in the border town of Sudzha, where Russians enter Ukraine for transit to Europe.

Reuters could not verify the video. Reports from Russian sources said Ukraine was in control of parts of Sudzha. Gas was still flowing through the pipeline on Saturday.

Alexander Bortnikov, head of the Federal Security Service (FSB), ordered an anti-terrorist regime to be imposed in Kursk, Bryansk and Belgorod regions – which have a combined area of ​​almost 92,000 square km.

The measures essentially give security services broad powers to lock down an area, including controls on communications and restrictions on a range of ordinary freedoms. Thousands of civilians were evacuated from the Kursk region.

Some reports said Ukrainian forces were pushing towards the Kursk nuclear power plant, which supplies much of southern Russia’s electricity. It has a total of six reactors, two shut down, two under construction and two operational.

The acting governor of the Kursk region, Alexei Smirnov, said drone debris fell on an electrical substation near Kurchatov, the city that serves the Kursk nuclear power plant, which said it was operating normally on Saturday.

The head of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency noted “significant military activity” in the area and called for restraint.

Russian diplomats in Vienna told the IAEA that fragments were found, possibly from downed missiles, although there was no evidence of an attack on the station.