Russia Launches New Operation To Halt Advancing Ukrainian Troops

Moscow, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 10th Aug, 2024) Moscow on Saturday mounted a "counter-terror operation" in three border regions adjoining Ukraine to halt Kyiv's advance deeper into Russia and warned that the fighting endangered a nuclear power plant.

Ukrainian units stormed into Russia's western Kursk region on Tuesday morning in a shock attack, the largest and most successful cross-border offensive by Kyiv of the two-and-a-half year conflict.

Its troops have advanced several kilometres and Russia's army has rushed in reserves and extra equipment -- though neither side has given precise details on the forces they have committed.

Russia's nuclear agency on Saturday warned the Ukrainian attack posed a "direct threat" to the nearby Kursk nuclear power station.

At least 16,000 civilians requested state assistance to leave their homes in Russian border areas, where emergency aid has been ferried in, and extra trains to the capital Moscow have been put on for people fleeing.

"The war has come to us," one woman from the border zone told AFP at a Moscow train station on Friday, declining to give her name.

Russia's army confirmed Saturday it will still fighting the Ukrainian incursion.

It said Kyiv initially crossed the border with around 1,000 troops, around 20 armoured vehicles and 11 tanks. Though it claimed Saturday to have destroyed five times that much military hardware so far.