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MOSCOW, Sept 12 (Reuters) – A Russian official in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region said on Monday that Ukrainian forces outnumbered Russian and pro-Russian forces by eight times during a lightning counter-offensive over the weekend. Ukrainian forces captured the Russian supply hubs of Izium and Kupiansk over the weekend, Russia’s worst military defeat since its forces were forced back from Kyiv shortly after President Vladimir Putin ordered troops into Ukraine. Speaking to state-run Rossiya-24 TV channel, Vitaly Gadchev said Ukrainian forces had captured settlements formerly controlled by Russia in the northern part of the region, reaching as far as the border with Russia, and that “about 5,000” civilians had been evacuated to Russia . . Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comSign up Gadchev said “the situation is getting more difficult by the hour,” adding that the border with Russia’s Belgorod region is now closed. Reuters could not immediately verify reports on the battlefield. Russia’s Defense Ministry released a map on Sunday showing that Russian forces had almost entirely left the Kharkiv region. In the Russian-controlled Kherson region of southern Ukraine, where a slower offensive has seen Kiev forces make modest gains in recent weeks, a Russian official said there was no cause for concern. “There is no panic in Kherson,” Kirill Stremousov said in a video posted on Telegram, acknowledging that the news from the Kharkiv region had disturbed some pro-Russian locals. The US-based Institute for the Study of War reported on Monday increased Ukrainian advances in the Kherson region, with Kiev’s forces inching closer to the city of Kherson, after weeks of artillery bombardment that strained Russia’s supply lines on the Dnipro River . “It’s calm. Maybe it’s the calm before the storm, but we’re ready to stand to the end and we won’t hand over the Russian city of Kherson to anyone,” Stremusov said. Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comSign up Report from Reuters. edited by Guy Faulconbridge Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
