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According to news agencies, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a speech to the Ukrainian ambassador in Kiev that Ukrainian troops are continuing operations in the Kursk region of western Russia and that they have taken control of more than 1,250 square kilometers of land and 92 villages in the region. The Moscow Times website cited a list of presidential activities on the Kremlin website and pointed out that Russian President Vladimir Putin has not made any public comments on the situation in the Kursk region since the August 12 meeting.
Reuters quoted the Ukrainian president as saying that if Western partners allowed Kiev to use long-range missiles against Russia, then the operation in the Kursk region would not be necessary. Zelensky also called on Western partners to allow Ukraine to use long-range weapons to stop the Russian advance in eastern Ukraine. “Ukraine only needs to make a decision to stop the advance of Russian troops, and we expect our partners to make such a decision,” he said, according to AFP.
Zelenskiy said the Kursk operation disproved the notion of an imaginary “red line” drawn by Russian President Vladimir Putin as an uncrossable border in his war against Ukraine.
“Just a few months ago, many people in the world – if they heard that we were planning such an operation – would have said that it was impossible and that it was crossing the reddest of all existing red lines for Russia. But now the real success of our soldiers on the other side of the border and Putin’s inability to protect his territory speak for themselves,” Zelensky said in a speech posted on Facebook. “Our active preventive defense is the most effective countermeasure to Russian terrorist activities,” he stressed.
At the same time, he concluded that with the conquest of the Russian town of Souza, “the whole naive, illusory concept of the so-called red lines in relation to Russia” which, according to Zelensky, controls the perception of the war by some Western partners. “The world sees that everything in this war depends only on courage – on our courage and the courage of our partners,” he said, stressing that if Ukraine and its partners comply, Russia will have no choice but to accept a just peace. .
Ukraine has been resisting Russian aggression for more than two years, but this month it took the fight to Russian territory. However, the surprise attack in the Kursk region that began on August 6 did not stop Russia’s advance into the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine.
Zelensky described the Kursk region raid as the “greatest investment” in freeing Ukrainians from Russian captivity, as “the largest number of Russian prisoners captured in one operation is an important result, our goal,” he said, according to the RBK-Ukraine server. It is also possible to “clear” the Russian border area adjacent to Ukraine’s Sumy region from Russian troops, which the president said was also one of the “tactical” goals of the Ukrainian operation.
On Sunday, Zelensky identified as the goal of the operation the creation of a “buffer zone” that would prevent Russia from continually shelling Ukrainian border towns.
Putin has stopped speaking publicly about the situation in the Kursk region. He has not commented since a meeting with military commanders and provincial governors on August 12. Foreign troops invade Russian territory Putin has been busy with other things all week, from talks with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas (whom he promised “not to forget Gaza”) to a visit to Baku, where he expressed his desire to play a role in establishing peace in the South Caucasus, according to The Moscow Times.
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Political scientist Abbas Galliamov believes that this incident shows that Putin has completely lost sight of what is most important on the agenda. He added: “Russians watched all this and were surprised that for the president the needs of the Palestinians and victims of the Armenian-Azerbaijani war are more important than the suffering of the people of the Kursk region.”
However, analyst Mark Galeotti believes that it is not uncommon for Putin to “isolate himself” during a crisis. Similarly, during the covid-19 pandemic, he isolated himself in his residence. Galeotti believes that Putin’s characteristic is to shift serious problems to others.
“What is happening in the border areas must be assessed, of course it will be assessed. But the main thing now is to solve the current tasks (…), and the main task is undoubtedly the Ministry of Defense, which must drive the enemy out of our territory and, together with the border guards, ensure reliable protection of the state borders,” Putin announced at the August 12 meeting. “The enemy will certainly receive an appropriate response, and all the goals we set for ourselves will be achieved without a doubt,” he stressed.
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