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What to Know About Russia’s Drive to Push Ukraine’s Troops Out of Kursk
Russia claimed to retake a key town in the area from Ukrainian forces. Ukraine’s top military commander has said that its forces would continue to “hold the line.”
Russian troops appear close to driving Ukraine from all the territory it seized in the Kursk region of Russia last year, a battlefield success that would deny President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine a significant bargaining chip in any negotiations.
The Russian push in Kursk appeared to accelerate after President Trump froze military aid and intelligence support to Ukraine on March 3. The flow of aid resumed this week as Ukraine agreed to a Trump administration proposal for a 30-day cease-fire with Russia.
On Thursday, Mr. Putin expressed preliminary support for the proposal but said he still had questions that required more discussion. Those questions, he told a news conference, included the fate of Ukrainian troops still in Kursk — suggesting that he may demand Kyiv order them to lay down their arms.
Here is a look at the Ukrainian incursion — the first on Russian soil since World War II — and how Russian troops are fighting back.
Why is Kursk important?
Kursk is an area of western Russia that borders the Sumy region of Ukraine. Sumy had long been thought to be a place where Russia might try opening a new front in its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which began in February 2022.
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