Russia-Ukraine war latest: Russian Defense Ministry says Kiev troops have advanced 15 miles toward Kursk, Russian defenses in disarray

Ukraine’s interior minister said Ukraine has set up storage facilities in the northern Sumy region to store and deliver humanitarian aid to Russian civilians in the Kiev-controlled area of ​​western Russia’s Kursk region.

Ukraine said it had taken control of 82 settlements covering 1,150 square kilometers (444 square miles) in the region after launching a massive cross-border assault on August 6.

“The citizens abandoned by Russia are mostly elderly people, disabled people and families with children. They need food, water and medicine,” Minister Ihor Klemenko said on the Telegram messaging app.

He did not specify how many storage facilities had been set up or where they were located, but a video posted by the ministry on its Telegram account showed a huge inflatable tent and Ukrainian military personnel moving parcels and packaging food.

Klemenko said that during a visit to the Sumy region, which borders Russia’s Kursk region, about 150 food parcels were delivered to civilians in the region.

Officials in Kiev said they planned to open an evacuation corridor in the Kursk region and open access to international humanitarian aid groups.

Russia has called Ukraine’s aggression a “major provocation” and vowed a “due response” more than two and a half years since it launched a full-scale invasion of its smaller neighbor.

Vladimir Putin chairs a Security Council meeting in Moscow to discuss Ukraine’s incursion into Russia’s Kursk region.

During the meeting, he said discussions would focus on “new technological solutions” to be adopted in military operations.

Military authorities in the eastern Ukrainian town of Pokrovsk have urged civilians to speed up their evacuation as Russian troops are rapidly approaching a region that has been one of Moscow’s main targets for months.

The authorities said in the cable that Russian troops “are advancing rapidly. With each passing day, there is less and less time to pack up personal belongings and move to safer areas.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned on Thursday that Pokrovsk and other nearby towns in the Donetsk region “are facing the heaviest Russian attack.”

“Priority supplies – everything that is needed – are on their way there,” Zelensky said on TV X.

An adviser to Ukraine’s president said on Friday that Kiev’s cross-border incursion into Russia’s Kursk region was aimed at persuading Moscow to start “fair” peace talks.

Myhaylo Podolak said Ukraine had no intention of occupying Kursk, but must force Russia to start negotiations on Kiev’s terms.

“We need to inflict a major tactical defeat on Russia. In the Kursk region we clearly saw how military means can objectively convince the Russian Federation to enter a fair negotiation process,” Podolak wrote on Telegram.

Ukraine launched a cross-border offensive against Russia last week and seized parts of the Kursk region.

Senior Ukrainian officials have repeatedly said any peace deal should fully respect Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022 and currently controls about 18% of its territory.