Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Monday that some 38,000 Russian troops have been killed or wounded fighting in Russia's western Kursk region since August, with Kyiv now launching a fresh offensive in the border region.

Ukraine has largely been driven out of Kurakhove, a battered but strategic town in the Donbas, Russia said. Kyiv’s forces were pressing a renewed offensive in southern Russia.

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Russian forces continue to make costly but consistent gains in the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine. They are steadily grinding down a pocket of resistance around the town of Kurakhove and are also fighting to envelop the larger nearby city of Pokrovsk, Ukrainian soldiers and officials said.

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Kyiv troops attacked in at least three areas within the Kursk region, some using armoured vehicles, according to the Institute for the Study of War