Ukraine pounds Russia with drones and says it is advancing deeper

[August 14, 2024]  By Guy Faulconbridge and Lidia Kelly

MOSCOW (Reuters) -Ukraine pounded Russia with missiles and drones on Wednesday and said it was advancing deeper in the biggest foreign incursion into Russia since World War Two that U.S. President Joe Biden said posed a dilemma for President Vladimir Putin.

Thousands of Ukrainian troops rammed through the Russian border in the early hours of Aug. 6 into Russia's western Kursk region in what Putin said was a major provocation that was aimed at gaining a stronger hand in possible future ceasefire talks.

Ukraine carved out a slice of the Russian border region of Kursk and though Putin said the Russian army would push out the Ukrainian troops, more than a week of intense battles have so far failed to expel them.

"The situation still remains difficult," said Yuri Podolyaka, an influential Ukrainian-born, pro-Russian military blogger. "The enemy still has the initiative, and so, albeit slowly, it is increasing its presence in the Kursk region."

Russia said on Wednesday that it had destroyed 117 Ukrainian drones in Russia overnight, mostly in the Kursk, Voronezh and Belgorod and Nizhny Novgorod regions. It said missiles had also been shot down and showed Sukhoi Su-34 bombers striking Ukrainian positions in Kursk.

Unconfirmed reports said some of the Ukrainian drones struck Russian air bases. Russia's National Guard said it was beefing up security at the Kursk nuclear power plant which is just 35 km (22 miles) from the fighting.

Russian commanders had said that the front in Kursk had stabilized, though Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said his forces were continuing to advance there and ordered his generals to develop the next "key steps" in the operation.

Biden said that U.S. officials were in constant touch with Ukraine over the invasion of Russia, which he said had "created a real dilemma" for Putin, who ordered thousands of troops into Ukraine in 2022.

The White House said Ukraine did not provide advance notice of its incursion and the United States had no involvement in the operation, though Russian officials have suggested Ukraine's Western backers must have known of the attack.

The Ukrainian assault on Russia has dramatically changed the narrative around the war. Russia had been advancing since the failure of Ukraine's 2023 counteroffensive to make any major gains against Moscow's forces.

RUSSIA ON DEFENSIVE

Russian state television said Russian forces were turning the tide on the Ukrainian forces, showed footage of successful attacks on Ukrainian positions and gave wide coverage of the evacuations of Russian civilians from the border zone.

Ukrainian servicemen ride a military vehicle, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, near the Russian border in Sumy region, Ukraine August 12, 2024. REUTERS/Viacheslav Ratynskyi/File Photo

Ukraine's state television on Wednesday showed Ukrainian troops pulling down a Russian flag from an official building in the Russian border town of Sudzha, a transhipment hub for Russian natural gas flowing to Europe via Ukraine.

By bringing the war to Russia, Ukraine has forced nearly 200,000 Russians to evacuate border regions near the site of the World War Two battle of Kursk, where in 1943 the Red Army defeated Nazi forces in one of the world's biggest ever battles.

Putin said on Monday that Ukraine "with the help of its Western masters" was aiming to improve Kyiv's negotiating position ahead of possible peace talks.

But he questioned what negotiations there could be with an enemy he accused of firing indiscriminately at Russian civilians and nuclear facilities.

The Russian rouble weakened against the dollar on Wednesday, and has lost 8.5% since the start of the Ukrainian attack on Aug. 6.

Russian officials say Ukraine is trying to show its Western backers that it can still muster major military operations as pressure mounts on both Kyiv and Moscow to agree to talk about halting the war.

Zelenskiy has said Ukraine launched the incursion into Russian territory to pressure Moscow's forces and "restore justice" after Russia's February 2022 invasion.

The offensive brings risks for Kyiv: Ukraine may leave other parts of the front exposed by dedicating forces to fighting in Russian sovereign territory. Russia controls 18% of Ukrainian territory and has been advancing in recent months.

Former Ukrainian Defence Minister Andriy Zagorodnyuk said the goal appeared to be to "distract (Russian) forces and its leadership's attention and resources" from the frontline in Ukraine.

Russian military bloggers said that they expected Ukraine to make at least one more major move over coming days. In Russia's border region of Belgorod, the governor, Vyacheslav Gladkov, declared a regionwide state of emergency.

"The situation in the Belgorod region continues to be extremely difficult and tense," Gladkov said, adding that Ukrainian strikes had killed civilians.

(Writing by Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; Editing by Miral Fahmy, Jamie Freed and Ros Russell)

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