Russian forces lost almost 1,400 fighters and 50 artillery systems in the past day, Ukraine said early on Tuesday, as the Kremlin pushes forward to threaten a key Ukrainian city in the country’s eastern Donetsk region and Kyiv holds its grip on swathes of Russia’s southern Kursk region.
Moscow sustained 1,380 casualties between Monday and Tuesday, Ukrainian authorities said, bringing Kyiv’s tally of total Russian casualties to 627,790.
Updated figures from Ukraine on Tuesday put Russia’s artillery losses at 50 over the past day—with a total of 17,880 systems lost during Russia’s full-scale invasion of the country, which began in February 2022.
Newsweek could not independently verify these numbers and has contacted the Russian Defense Ministry for comment via email.
Russian Defense Press Service via AP
Casualty counts and battlefield losses are murky during active conflicts, and experts urge caution when considering tallies offered by either party in a war.
Russia does not offer regular updates on purported Ukrainian casualties, but it said on Monday that Ukraine had sustained more than 2,000 casualties across the front lines in the war-torn country during the previous day.
Kyiv’s forces lost a further 240 fighters in battles in Russia’s southern Kursk region between Sunday and Monday, Moscow said. Newsweek could not independently verify this figure.
In response to a request for comment, the Ukrainian Armed Forces told Newsweek that Russia “constantly lies in its official reports and minimizes its own losses. Information warfare and [R]ussian propaganda continues.”
On August 6, Ukraine launched a surprise push into Kursk, which sits across the border from northeastern Ukraine. The pouring of thousands of Kyiv’s fighters into southern Russia marked the most significant advance into internationally recognized Russian territory during the war.
Ukraine has clinched control of more than 1,300 square kilometers—or just over 500 square miles—of territory and 100 settlements in Kursk, President Volodymyr Zelensky said earlier this month. But as the incursion has slowed, Russia has maintained the pressure on the eastern front lines as it continues its advance toward the strategic city of Pokrovsk.
The Donetsk transit hub of Pokrovsk has been referred to as a “fortress” settlement, key to Ukrainian defenses in the east and connected to other critical defensive cities, including Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka and Kostiantynivka.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Monday that it had captured Memryk, a settlement east of Pokrovsk. The day before, the Russian government said it had seized the Donetsk settlement of Novohrodivka, just southeast of Pokrovsk.
Ukraine’s military did not mention Memryk in a statement it released early on Tuesday, but it said it had stopped 41 Russian attacks close to Pokrovsk in the previous 24 hours.
Many of the assaults focused on Novohrodivka and Mykhailivka, a settlement to the south, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said.
The U.K. Defense Ministry, using Ukraine’s casualty count, said in early September that Moscow’s average daily casualty rate for its war effort had increased to 1,187 throughout August. This is likely due to the Kursk offensive and the demands of the push on Pokrovsk, the British government said.