Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on April 19, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 24, 2026
Add as preferred source on Google
Russian forces have nearly expelled Ukrainian troops from Kursk, with 99.5% of the region under Russian control, according to military chief Valery Gerasimov.
(Reuters) - Moscow's troops have driven out Ukrainian forces from nearly all of Russia's western Kursk region, Russia's military chief Valery Gerasimov said on Saturday.
"The bulk of the area where the invasion took place has now been cleared," Gerasimov told President Vladimir Putin in a televised meeting.
"It's 1,260 square km, 99.5%."
Russia has been trying to eject Ukrainian forces from Kursk since August last year after Kyiv's troops mounted a surprise incursion that embarrassed Putin and which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy hoped would give him a bargaining chip in any future talks to end the war.
Gerasimov updated Putin on the battlefield developments, which Reuters could not independently verify, shortly before the Kremlin chief announced a unilateral Easter ceasefire in Ukraine.
Gerasimov said Ukraine was holding onto just 3 square km of Kursk around the villages of Oleshnya and Gornal, which lie just on the border.
The Defence Ministry said on Saturday that Russia had recaptured Oleshnya from Ukraine.
In recent weeks Russia has retaken a swath of territory inside Kursk and has begun to push ahead into Ukraine's neighbouring Sumy region.
At the same time, Ukraine has also made a fresh push into Russia's Belgorod region, south of Kursk. Gerasimov told Putin that troops were successfully suppressing Ukrainian attacks there.
(Reporting by Lucy Papachristou; Editing by Andrew Heavens and Alison Williams)
The article discusses the near-total expulsion of Ukrainian troops from Russia's Kursk region by Russian forces.
Russian military claims 99.5% of Kursk is under their control, with Ukraine holding only 3 sq km.
The expulsion of Ukrainian troops from Kursk could impact future negotiations and military strategies.
Explore more articles in the Headlines category
