Putin vows to ‘kick enemy out’ as Russia evacuates second border region following Ukrainian invasion
A fuming Vladimir Putin has vowed to “kick the enemy out of our territory” after Ukraine’s surprise attack on Kursk.
Ukrainian forces had surged into Kursk, in southwest Russia, last Tuesday – where they have remained ever since – in an astonishing incursion which left the 71-year-old premier “nervous and angry“.
Putin claimed the attack was a move to “intimidate Russian society and to undermine stability”, as well as to give Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky leverage in prospective future negotiations.
The Russian number one hailed what he called a “dramatically increasing” series of losses for Ukraine’s troops in Russia – and vowed a full retaliation, despite a week already having passed since the incursion.
Putin added: “The enemy will certainly receive a worthy response, and all the goals facing us will, without a doubt, be achieved.”
Zelensky, who had for days remained tight-lipped on the incursion, publicly confirmed that his forces had rounded up Russian prisoners of war who could be swapped for captured Ukrainian fighters, touting what he described as an expanding “exchange fund”.
After local officials, following a consultation with Putin, declared a state of emergency in Kursk last week, Russia’s neighbouring Belgorod region saw mass evacuations yesterday as reports of “active” Ukrainian troops on the border flooded in.
Some 11,000 people have so far been cleared out of Belgorod’s Krasnoyaruzhsky district as fears begin to mount over Zelensky’s men bedding in on Russian soil, only adding to the 80,000 already evacuated from Kursk.
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Belgorod’s regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov has already warned residents of missile threats, urging locals to “go down to the basement [and] stay there” until an all-clear is sounded.
But it’s not just Putin who has been left reeling – senior diplomats at the UN raged at Ukraine’s allies in the West on Tuesday, prompting accusations of hypocrisy in return.
The three permanent Western members of the UN Security Council, France, Britain and the US, were forced to field accusations of “covering up the abhorrent crimes of their puppet” by Russia’s deputy UN ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy.
In return, the allied trio’s diplomats reeled off their own accusations against Russia – namely that it had repeatedly violated international humanitarian law and human rights in Ukraine.
US diplomat Caleb Pine said: “There is no question as to which country has committed numerous well-documented atrocities, including war crimes and crimes against humanity, on Ukraine’s sovereign territory… That country is Russia!”
While Slovenia’s Klemen Ponikvar joined in with the war of words, saying: “We will not recognise the aggressor as the victim,” joining several non-permanent council members to accuse Russia of hypocrisy, double standards and wasting officials’ time.
Back in Ukraine, a bullish Zelensky told his country in his standard nightly address that his forces had shown they could seize the initiative in the war – like in 2022, when it recovered swathes of land and bruised Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.
The Ukrainian president said: “Now we have done the exact same thing – we have proven once again that we, Ukrainians, are capable of achieving our goals in any situation – capable of defending our interests and our independence.”