Russian officials detailed the scale of civilian evacuations from towns and villages in the Kursk region where invading Ukrainian troops are being confronted by Moscow’s counter-terrorism troops.
“More than 76,000 people have been temporarily relocated to safe places,” the state-run TASS news agency quoted an official from the regional emergency situations ministry as saying at a press briefing on Saturday.
Emergency aid has been ferried into the border area and extra trains to the capital Moscow have been put on for people fleeing the fighting.
“The war has come to us,” one woman — who declined to give her name — told Agence France-Presse (AFP) after arriving at a Moscow train station on Friday.
Russia’s army on Saturday confirmed it was still fighting the Ukrainian incursion for a fifth day.
It said Kyiv’s forces had initially crossed the border with around 1,000 troops, 20 armored vehicles and 11 tanks, though it claimed on Saturday to have destroyed five times that much military hardware so far.
Russia’s national anti-terrorism committee said late Friday it was starting “counter-terror operations in the Belgorod, Bryansk and Kursk regions” to protect citizens.
The Belgorod and Bryansk regions bordering Ukraine have also been hit hard by shelling and aerial attacks since Russia launched its offensive in February 2022.
Russia’s nuclear agency on Saturday warned of a “direct threat” to the nearby Kursk nuclear power station, less than 50 kilometers from the fighting.
“The actions of the Ukrainian army pose a direct threat” to the Kursk plant in western Russia, state news agencies cited its atomic energy agency Rosatom as saying.
On the offensive
In Kyiv, army chief Oleksandr Syrsky reported to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on actions “pushing the war into the aggressor’s territory.”
A senior Ukrainian security official has told AFP that “we are on the offensive. The aim is to stretch the positions of the enemy, to inflict maximum losses and to destabilize the situation in Russia as they are unable to protect their own border.”
Asked whether 1,000 Ukrainian troops were taking part in the assault, the official said: “It is a lot more... thousands.”
Meanwhile, a man and his four-year-old son were killed in an overnight Russian missile attack near the Ukrainian capital, the emergency service said Sunday.
The 35-year-old man and his son were found dead in the rubble of a building during search and rescue operations, it said. Three other people were seriously injured.
Explosions rang out Saturday night in the center and east of Kyiv, AFP journalists noted.
Air raid sirens sounded in the capital and at least two flashes could be seen against the night sky, said an AFP reporter.
Kyiv’s military administration said in a post on Telegram that the city’s air defense systems had been activated. Ukraine’s air force said five other regions were being attacked by drones.
Fragments of a missile fell on residential buildings in Brovary district, neighboring Kyiv, the State Emergency Service of Ukraine said on Telegram.