Russia has halved the pace of its offensive in Ukraine

In the period from December 1 to 26, Russia occupied 345 square kilometers of territory Ukraine. This is twice less than in November this year, when Russian forces took control over 700 square kilometers of the territory of the neighboring country, reported the independent Russian portal Agientstwo.

Over the past month, Russian troops have advanced most actively in the western part of the front, in the area of ​​the cities of Pokrovsk and Kurakhov (Donetsk Oblast), we read.

The agency reminds that Pokrovsk is an important logistics center for the Ukrainian armed forces. The city is also home to the country's only coking coal mine, important for steel production. Currently, the Russian military is only about five kilometers from this city.

The agency reports that Russian forces have increased the pace of their operations on another sector of the front, in the Kursk Oblast. Ukrainian forces launched an offensive in this border region in early August.

In the Kursk Oblast, Russia managed to regain control over 85.4 square kilometers of territory. Russian troops have approached the town of Malaya Loknya and are controlling part of the area near the border (with Ukraine – ed.) in the Sudzhan region – wrote an independent Russian portal. He recalls that the pace of the offensive of Russian forces in the Kursk Oblast was also higher in November. During this time, Russia regained control over 216 square kilometers of land.

The agency reports that in just a year, Russia has acquired 3,183 square kilometers of area in Ukraine. “If we subtract from this number the territory occupied and currently controlled by the Ukrainian armed forces in the Kursk Oblast (493.6 square kilometers), this number will amount to 2,689.4 square kilometers. This is comparable to the area of ​​Moscow,” writes the portal.

At the end of 2023, the area of ​​Ukraine controlled by Russia decreased by 191 square kilometers compared to the end of 2022, reports an independent Russian website.

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Russia's losses in military equipment over the past year amount to 5,955 units, including 1,053 tanks, 711 armored combat vehicles, 2,041 infantry fighting vehicles, 193 armored personnel carriers and 35 aircraft. This is more than last year, when the Russian army lost 5,123 units of equipment – writes Agientstwo, citing the findings of Dutch experts who run the Oryx military blog.

Ukraine's losses during the year amounted to 2,459 units of equipment (290 tanks, 76 armored fighting vehicles, 308 infantry fighting vehicles, 301 armored personnel carriers, 25 aircraft). This is also more than last year, when the country's armed forces lost 2,219 pieces of equipment.

According to the reports of the General Staff of the Ukrainian Army, since the beginning of the armed invasion in February 2022, the human losses of the Russian army amount to almost 786,000 soldiers (dead and wounded – ed.).

Since the beginning of the aggression, enemy forces – according to data provided by the Ukrainian side – have also lost, among others, 9,656 tanks, nearly 20,000 armored vehicles and over 20,000 artillery systems.

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The Ukrainian section of Radio Svoboda previously noted that neither Russia nor Ukraine reveal almost any information about their losses in the war. The number of victims is reported by independent Russian media, based on open sources. In mid-November, the BBC's Russian section and the Mediazona website identified the names of 78,329 Russian soldiers who died in Ukraine.

On February 25, 2024, after two years of invasion, the president Volodymyr Zelensky revealed that 31,000 Ukrainian soldiers died during the war. At the same time, he said he could not reveal how many of them were injured or missing.

In September, Ukrainian media, quoting the Wall Street Journal, which referred to the findings of Western intelligence, reported that the losses of Ukrainian forces could reach 480,000 soldiers (killed and wounded).