Anti-Putin Russians Have Inflicted "Huge Losses" On Kremlin Border Troops

Anti-Putin Russian units like the Russian Volunteer Corps and the Siberian Battalion continue to fight inside the Russian border around Belgorod and Kursk unlike previous incursions where they eventually retreated.

These most recent Ukrainian-backed attacks, which began in March, have reportedly inflicted "huge" casualties on Russian forces deployed to try to stop them. JL 

Kateryna Zakharchenko reports in the Kyiv Post:

Ukraine’s Intelligence Directorate published an intercepted phone conversation on Tuesday, April 9, about huge losses in the Ukraine-bordering Grayvoronsky District of Russia’s Belgorod region. On March 12, Russian volunteer-fighter forces opposed to Vladimir Putin’s rule and aligned with Kyiv, entered Russia’s Belgorod and Kursk regions. They’ve been continually engaged in combat with government forces there. “They destroyed half of Gorkovsky [a village in the Greivoronsky district of Belgorod region]. And now they're still bombing the f**k out of it.”

Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR) published an intercepted phone conversation on Tuesday, April 9, in which a Russian soldier complains about huge losses in his unit in the Ukraine-bordering Grayvoronsky District of Russia’s Belgorod region.

“It is a total f*****g mess. Completely f****d up,” the soldier says in the phone conversation.

He also talks about a new brigade, which he refers to as a “gang,” being formed with 500 individuals.

“Now they are saying at a meeting that they are going to form new brigades,” he added. “On Saturday and Sunday, they prepared the guys for deployment up to 7:00 or 8:00,” he says.

Fighting in Belgorod and Kursk regions

On March 12, Russian volunteer-fighter forces opposed to Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s rule and aligned with Kyiv, entered Russia’s Belgorod and Kursk regions. They say they’ve been continually engaged in combat with government forces there.

 

The volunteer-fighters come from the Legion of Freedom of Russia (LSR), the Russian Volunteer Corps (RVC), and the Siberian Battalion.

In a series of conversations recently intercepted by HUR and published by Kyiv Post, civilians in Russia's Belgorod region complain that they cannot sleep at night because the Russian army has placed its military equipment in residential areas and opened fire.

“They decided to put Grads at the intersection near Kirpichne. It's so loud, it's like a f*****g hailstorm at the intersection,” a woman says in a phone conversation.

 

The woman adds that she was unable to sleep through the night because of the constant shelling and fire.

“They say they destroyed half of Gorkovsky [a village in the Greivoronsky district of Belgorod region]. And now they're still bombing the f**k out of it,” she says.

Kyiv Post interviewed a woman who works in intelligence as a professional eavesdropper

Last year, Kyiv Post interviewed Maria* who works as one of Ukrainian intelligence’s professional eavesdroppers and spoke about the shocking things she hears.

Russia regularly dismisses the content of intercepted calls published by Ukraine, saying they are faked, a claim Kyiv Post put to Maria.

 

She said: “Yes, they all are real even though they might seem insane. Sometimes I can’t believe the words I’m hearing myself, but we have what we have.”