Another High Profile Russian General Killed By Ukrainian Forces

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The Ukrainians are continuing to obtain significant battlefield success in their ongoing fight against the Russian invaders who’ve poured into their country since February 24. Now, another Russian general — Major-General Roman Kutuzov, who’d been commanding forces associated with the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic — has reportedly been killed.

Unlike other apparent Russian losses amid fighting in Ukraine, Kutuzov’s death was reported on by Russian government-owned media. Kutuzov was reportedly killed by Ukraine in the country’s Donbas region, which encompasses its Donetsk and Luhansk provinces and has recently become a high-profile focus in the country of ground-level fighting — although Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, was struck this past weekend. Russian troops are attempting to completely seize the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, where two self-proclaimed independent republics — including the entity whose troops Kutuzov was commanding — are situated. The independence of these supposed republics hasn’t been broadly recognized. Their existence connects to Russian attempts to destabilize Ukraine.

“Russian commanders have been increasingly forced to the front in an attempt to drive forward the invasion and Moscow has confirmed the deaths of three senior generals,” the BBC says. Per Ukrainian naval infantry officer Dmitry Ivanov, Kutuzov — prior to his death — directed an assault on a Donetsk-region settlement, where he “was forced to lead” the attack. Per available details reported on by Ukrinform, an information source associated with the Ukrainian government, Kutuzov was killed near Popasna, although that point of reference is in the Luhansk region (which is next to the Donetsk region).

Although Russian troops are continuing their attempts to secure territorial gains in Ukraine on behalf of the Putin regime, Ukrainian personnel have, by all appearances, inflicted substantial overall losses on the Russian military. Ukraine says they’ve killed over 31,200 Russian troops and wiped 1,386 Russian tanks, 3,400 armored fighting vehicles, 690 artillery pieces, and a whole lot more off the battlefield. (Some pieces of Russian equipment have apparently been recovered by Ukraine in at least relatively working order throughout the course of the presently unfolding war). Meanwhile, retired Russian Air Force Major-General Kanamat Botashev was reportedly recently shot down in the Luhansk region. Botashev might have been in Ukraine in association with the Wagner group, a paramilitary organization that’s been tied to the Russian government. Rob Lee, with the Foreign Policy Research Institute, said in reference to Botashev it “appears he was flying for Wagner.”

The U.K. defense ministry said in a Monday Ukraine-related update that “heavy fighting continues in the contested town of Sieverodonetsk and Russian forces continue to push towards Sloviansk as part of their attempted encirclement of Ukrainian forces.” Severodonetsk (as it’s also spelled) was reported over the weekend to be roughly half-controlled by Ukrainian personnel who retook parts of the city. The city — named by Ukrainian authorities as the administrative capital of the Luhansk region — had a population prior to the war of a little over 100,000.