Ukraine said Tuesday it would not hold on to Russian territory captured in its surprise cross-border incursion and offered to stop raids if Moscow agreed a “just peace”.
Ukrainian forces entered Russia’s Kursk region last Tuesday, taking over two dozen settlements in the biggest attack by a foreign army on Russian soil since World War II. Russia said Tuesday it had fended off new attacks in Kursk.
More than 120,000 people have fled the area and Ukraine’s military chief Oleksandr Syrsky said Monday that his troops controlled about 1,000 square kilometres of Russian territory.
At least 800 square kilometres was under Ukrainian control as of Monday, according to an AFP analysis of data from the US-based Institute for the Study of War.
Foreign ministry spokesman Georgiy Tykhy on Tuesday said Kyiv was not interested in “taking over” Russian territory and defended Ukraine’s actions as “absolutely legitimate”.
“The sooner Russia agrees to restore a just peace… the sooner the raids by the Ukrainian defences forces into Russia will stop,” he told reporters.
Ukraine meanwhile said it was imposing movement restrictions in a 20-kilometre zone in Sumy region along the border with Kursk region due to an “increase in the intensity of hostilities” and “sabotage” activities.
Russia’s defence ministry said it had “foiled” new Ukrainian attacks in Kursk by “enemy mobile groups in armoured vehicles to break through deep into Russian territory”.
Alexander Bortnikov, head of Russia’s FSB security service, also said in a statement that Ukraine had carried out the attack “with the support of the collective West”.
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