Captured Russians, Sudzha, and destroyed equipment: Videos of Ukrainian Armed Forces in Kursk region
Photo: Ukrainian soldiers publish video from the Kursk region (Getty Images)
The operation in the Kursk region of Russia, which Ukraine has officially confirmed, has been going on for eight days. During this time, a number of videos of the Ukrainian Armed Forces taking Russian soldiers prisoner, destroying enemy equipment, and speaking Ukrainian with the locals have appeared online.
Yesterday, the Ukrainian military showed a drive through the central square of the city of Sudzha. The video was posted by fighters from the Bravo group of the 130th separate reconnaissance battalion. Radio Liberty journalists geolocated the location of the soldiers - presumably, the video was filmed on Karl Marx Street. The date of filming is unknown.
In the video, the fighter says that he did not see Russian soldiers in the city center.
In another published video, the Bravo group showed a drive through the city center from the window of an armored vehicle, including nearby Sovetskaya Square. There are no traces of Russian troops, or any civilians in the video.
Yesterday, the 225th separate assault battalion of the Ukrainian Armed Forces showed a video from Darino, Sudzhansky district. It shows soldiers tearing down a Russian flag from an administrative building after a sweep.
“Darino. Soldiers of the 225th Separate Brigade are removing a rag from the administrative building after a sweep,” the video's description reads.
Not only soldiers post footage from the Kursk region online. MP from the Holos party Roman Kostenko posted on Facebook that he had gone on a “business trip.” The MP posted a video of him crossing the border with the aggressor country in military uniform.
“Ruslan Oleksiiovych (Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada - ed.), I am now near Russia. I'm sorry that I'm here without permission, but I'm going there with our Defense Forces. And then I will write a letter about the business trip,” Kostenko said.
One of the important benefits of the events in the Kursk region is the replenishment of the POW exchange fund. Images of captured Russians, usually in large numbers, are spreading on social media.
The Ukrainian state project Hochu Zhit (I Want to Live), created for Russians who want to voluntarily surrender, published a video of several dozen prisoners of war.
When asked where they were from, three men took turns answering “from Grozny.” It is alleged that they are Kadyrovites captured in the Kursk region. According to them, they were trying to escape to avoid captivity, as Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov once said that Akhmat fighters do not surrender.
The project accentuates that Kadyrov's men are of particular value for further prisoner exchanges, as Russian negotiators “take them first.”
A Ukrainian soldier with the call sign “Alex” said on his Telegram channel yesterday that there are more than 1,000 Russian prisoners from the Kursk region.
Several videos showing the destruction of Russian equipment are also noteworthy. Soldiers of the Black Swan unit of the 225th separate mechanized brigade showed a video of strikes on enemy trucks.
The soldiers note that they have been destroying enemy logistics since the first days of the operation in the Kursk region. According to them, drones are now extremely important - the Russians do not have time to deliver ammunition because of the dense work of Ukrainian pilots.
Below you can also see a destroyed Russian tank ambush. It is reported that “the enemy was ambushing us, but it was ambushed.”
The burned-out equipment of the Russian troops was likely the result of using NLAW.
A video of locals in the Kursk region talking to Ukrainian soldiers in Ukrainian has also been spreading online. In the video, a soldier asks two elderly women if they are not being offended. In response, they ask the soldiers to give them a ride, but the soldiers refuse, explaining that they are carrying ammunition.
Radio Liberty spoke to one of the authors of the video. Soldier Serhii Prutskykh with the call sign “Kum” confirmed to journalists that this footage is from the Kursk region. He added that they helped some residents with water.
Fighting in Kursk region
Hostilities in the Kursk region began on August 6. Only yesterday, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy officially confirmed that the Ukrainian Armed Forces had indeed entered the Russian region. As the head of the army Oleksandr Syrskyi reported to him, as of August 12, Ukraine has already controlled 1,000 square kilometers of the Kursk region. Meanwhile, the acting governor of the Kursk region, Alexei Smirnov, says that the Russian army does not control 28 settlements in the region. According to the DeepState project, it may actually be about 44 settlements.
The Russian authorities have already announced the “anti-terrorist operation” in the Belgorod, Bryansk, and Kursk regions. Analysts believe this wording was chosen to not sow more panic among the population. Russian president Vladimir Putin yesterday convened a meeting on the situation in the regions bordering Ukraine, during which he ordered the defense ministry to “push Ukrainian fighters out of the territory of Russia.”
Sources: Bravo group of the 130th separate reconnaissance battalion, the 225th separate assault battalion of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, MP from the Holos party Roman Kostenko, the Ukrainian state project I want to live, the Black Swan unit of the 225th separate assault battalion, and Radio Liberty.
