Moscow has rushed reinforcement troops and military equipment to regions bordering Ukraine where Kyiv’s forces have staged a surprise incursion.
The Russian government also implemented emergency security measures in the regions — Bryansk, Belgorod and Kursk.
Russian tanks have taken up firing positions against Ukrainian mobile armored groups in the Kursk region, the Russian Defense Ministry said, according to a Tass report. The additional military supplies also include rocket launchers and aviation units, according to reports.
The reports come after Moscow late Friday implemented “counterterrorism measures” in the Bryansk, Belgorod and Kursk regions following a cross-border raid by Ukrainian forces earlier this week that is Kyiv’s largest in the two-and-a-half years of conflict since Moscow launched its all-out invasion in early 2022.
Russia was fighting intense battles on Saturday against thousands of Ukrainian troops as deep as 20 kilometers inside the Kursk region, according to media reports.
“The armed forces continue to repel the attempted invasion by the Ukrainian armed forces,” Russia’s defense ministry said on Saturday, according to a Reuters report. Intense battles were focused around Malaya Loknya, Olgovka and Ivashkovskoye, it said.
“The Kyiv regime made an unprecedented attempt to destabilize the situation in a number of regions of our country,” Russia’s National Antiterrorism Committee said in a statement justifying the operation “to ensure the safety of citizens and stop the threat of terrorist acts.”
Kyiv’s Western allies, sometimes reluctant about any attack inside Russian territory, have made no signs of opposing Kyiv’s military moves across the border. The U.S. on Friday announced an additional $125 million (€114 million) in weapons to assist Ukraine’s military operations against Russia, including anti-tank missiles and ammunition.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has so far refrained from commenting specifically on the incursion into Russia, but in his nightly address on Friday he said: “We are working to further limit Russia’s ability to wage this war.”
In a post on X on Friday, Zelenskyy said: “I thank each of our warriors — those who are destroying the Russian occupiers, holding the frontline, and ensuring that Ukraine remains on the world map.”
Some reports said Ukrainian forces were pushing toward the Kursk nuclear power station. The head of the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency warned about reports of “significant military activity” in the area and called for restraint. Russian diplomats in Vienna told the IAEA that fragments, possibly from downed missiles, had been found, though there was no evidence of an attack on the station, Reuters reported.
