Both Ukraine and Russia are reluctant to provide official information on soldiers killed. However, the Ukrainian army chief has now given a specific figure. You can find all the latest news about the war in Ukraine here in the ticker.
Tuesday, August 23, 6 a.m.: Ukraine and its EU neighbors have founded the so-called Kiev Initiative to strengthen their regional cooperation. This was announced by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday evening in Kyiv. He named the neighbors Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Hungary as well as the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania as participants. Cooperation is open to other countries. Zelenskyj said without further details that they wanted to cooperate primarily on security issues. “This is a very promising line of our work within the Euro-Atlantic alignment.”
In his video address, the President also addressed the so-called Crimea platform on Tuesday. Selenskyj announced that their format would be expanded. It is the second international meeting, after 2021, with which Ukraine is mobilizing support for the repatriation of the Crimean Peninsula, annexed from Russia in 2014. A speech by Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) is expected at the online summit. Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg are also scheduled to speak. A total of more than 50 participants from Europe, Asia, America and Africa have been announced.
6:24 p.m .: According to Ukrainian information, almost 9,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed since the Russian war of aggression that started at the end of February. Ukrainian army chief Valeriy Zalushny said at a forum in Kyiv on Monday, according to a report by the Interfax-Ukraine news agency, that Ukrainian children deserve special attention because their fathers are at the front and “possibly among the nearly 9,000 heroes killed.”
It is one of the extremely rare statements by the Ukrainian government or army leaders about their own losses in the war. On February 24, the Russian army launched a war of aggression against Ukraine. Since then, the Russian units have mainly occupied parts of southern Ukraine and the east of the country. Thousands of civilians were also killed in daily rocket and artillery attacks, and hundreds of thousands were forced to flee.
After 100 days of war, Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov admitted in June that up to a hundred Ukrainian soldiers were being killed and up to 500 injured every day during the heavy fighting in the east of the country. In early June, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy put the number of Ukrainian soldiers killed every day at between 60 and 100. The last overall balance is from mid-April. At that time, Selenskyj had spoken of up to 3,000 Ukrainian soldiers killed and around 10,000 injured.
12.44 p.m .: According to the Ukrainian General Staff, 45,400 Moscow soldiers have died since the beginning of the Russian war of aggression. In addition, Russia has so far lost 1,919 tanks, 4,230 armored fighting vehicles, 1,032 artillery systems, 198 helicopters, 234 aircraft, 815 drones and 15 boats. The information cannot be independently verified.
12:33 p.m .: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has warned of a show trial against soldiers in Russian captivity. If Russia organizes such a tribunal against Ukrainian prisoners, then this is a “line” after which negotiations are no longer possible. Selenskyj said that in his video message distributed on Monday night. He referred to media reports that pro-Moscow separatists and Russian troops were planning such a trial in the captured port city of Mariupol.
According to this, the Ukrainian prisoners of war could also be sentenced to the death penalty before an internationally unrecognized court. The occupation authorities accuse them of war crimes. Zelenskyy criticized the trial against the defenders of Ukraine as “disgusting and absurd” and in violation of all international legal norms. “Russia is cutting itself off from the negotiations,” he said.
The separatist leader in the Donetsk region, Denis Pushilin, said on Russian state television on Monday that Zelenskyy’s comments had no influence on the plans for the “Mariupol tribunal”. “All criminals, war criminals, especially the neo-Nazis of “Azov” must get their due punishment. There are quite a lot of such crimes,” said Puschilin. Preparations for the first stage of the tribunal were coming to an end. The trial date depends on investigators. “The material on 80 incidents of “Azov” crimes is completely ready, 23 people are arrested,” he said.
In May, the Ukrainian defenders of Mariupol, entrenched in the Azovstal Steel Works, surrendered. They were taken prisoner by the Russians. In Ukraine, men and women are revered as national heroes for months of defense of the city on the Azov Sea. Relatives of the prisoners of war of the “Azov regimen” had repeatedly called on the Ukrainian leadership to make more efforts for their release.
Monday, August 22, 12:05 a.m .: According to the authorities, another Ukrainian attack attempt was repelled over the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, which was annexed by Russia. Russian anti-aircraft defenses hit “objects” approaching the Belbek military airfield near Sevastopol, the city’s chief administrator, Mikhail Rasvozhayev, wrote on Telegram on Sunday evening. The information could not be checked independently.
There was only an explosion in Sevastopol on Saturday after Russian sources say a drone on the Black Sea Fleet headquarters was shot down by air defenses. So there were no victims.
In Crimea, which is part of Ukraine under international law, there have recently been repeated explosions, some of them heavy, including on an ammunition depot. Ukraine received this with satisfaction, but did not accept responsibility for the detonations.
12.50 p.m .: According to British military experts, there is criticism within the Russian armed forces that military competitions and ceremonies are being held despite the war in Ukraine. “A significant segment of Russian military and security experts are likely to believe that it is inappropriate to continue dedicating forces to ceremonial military events while Russian troops are suffering heavy casualties in Ukraine,” the Defense Ministry’s daily intelligence update said in London Sunday.
The British experts quoted a minister from the breakaway pro-Russian Donetsk People’s Republic as complaining about the holding of competitions such as the tank biathlon, a driving and shooting competition between tank crews and festivals by military bands. Since the start of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine at the end of February, the British government has regularly released intelligence information about its progress. Moscow accuses London of a targeted disinformation campaign.
Sunday, August 21, 08:30: Ukrainian forces are said to have destroyed a Russian command post in the Kherson region. The armed forces’ Southern Operational Command Group said its artillery also destroyed two ammunition depots in the region in the past 24 hours, allegedly killing 75 Russian soldiers. The information is not currently independently verified.
You can read more reports on the Ukraine conflict on the following pages.
