Russia has 20% of Ukraine
Moscow says killed hundreds of foreign ‘mercenaries’ working for Ukraine
Kyiv, Ukraine, June 2: Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Thursday that Russia controls about one-fifth of his country, including ground gained over Moscow’s invasion, the annexed Crimean peninsula and territory held by Moscowbacked separatists.
“Today, about 20 percent of our territory is under the control of the occupiers,” the Ukrainian leader said during an address to lawmakers in Luxembourg.
Russian forces are solidifying their hold on the eastern Donbas region and pushing steadily towards Ukraine’s de facto administrative centre in that region, Kramatorsk.
However, they pulled back from regions around the capital and in the northeast to focus on their offensive for the eastern industrial region.
Zelenskyy said that in 2014, Kremlin-backed separatists and the Russian military controlled 43,000 square kilometres (16,600
square miles), an area he compared to the size of the Netherlands.
But that figure — more than three months into Russia's invasion — had
increased to nearly 1,25,000 square kilometres, territory he said was “much greater” than the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg combined.
He also told lawmakers that an area more than twice that size — “nearly 3,00,000 square kilometres” — had been “polluted” with mines and unexploded ordnance.
“Twelve million Ukrainians are displaced and more than five million have gone abroad,” he added.
Meanwhile, Moscow said on Thursday that it has managed to stem the arrival of foreign “mercenaries” in Ukraine over the past month and that it has killed “hundreds” of them.
“Hundreds of foreign mercenaries in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russia's long-range precision weapons shortly after their arrival” to undergo training, the Russian defence ministry said in a statement.
“Most of the mercenaries have been destroyed in combat zones due to their low level of training and lack of real combat experience.” The Russian army said it has managed to stem the arrival of foreign mercenaries in Ukraine, estimating their current number in the proWestern country at around 3,500.