(Bloomberg) -- Russian authorities said at least two people had been killed and 13 wounded in what they said was an assault from across the border with Ukraine.
Russian troops and border guards are involved in repelling an incursion into the Kursk region of as many as 300 Ukrainian soldiers supported by tanks and armored vehicles, the Defense Ministry said Tuesday. Reserves are being called up to the area, according to the statement.
A woman died in the town of Sudzha, while a bus driver also killed in the area, Alexey Smirnov, the acting governor of the Russian region, said on Telegram.
Ukrainian officials and the military haven’t publicly commented, while the General Staff press service didn’t return calls for comment.
As Ukraine continues to fend off Kremlin forces with the invasion in its third year, it’s targeted Russian infrastructure and industrial facilities to try to undermine the country’s war machine.
Russia’s Belgorod and Kursk regions have faced drone and missile attacks, while units of anti-Kremlin Russian volunteers based in Ukraine have also staged cross-border raids. Tuesday’s events in the Kursk region don’t involve Ukraine-based Russian volunteers, the NV.ua news website said, citing an unidentified member of military intelligence.
Fighting in Ukraine itself has largely become deadlocked along a 1,270-kilometer (790-mile) front line in the east and southeast of the country, with neither side able to achieve significant territorial gains. Sudhza has previously been subject to cross-border shelling, though there has no reported disruption today to gas flows via a transit interconnection point in the area.
--With assistance from Volodymyr Verbianyi.
©2024 Bloomberg L.P.
