EPADuring a videoconferencing meeting with Putin on Saturday, Gerasimov said: “Today, the last colony in the Kursk region, the village of Gornal, was released from the Ukrainian forces.”
He praised what he described as the “heroism” of the North Korean troops which had “provided significant aid to defeat the group of the Ukrainian armed forces”.
“The adventure of the Kyiv regime has completely failed,” Putin told Gerasimov, saying that she would open the way for new Russian advances on other fronts.
Responding in an article on Telegram, the general staff of the Ukrainian army said that the situation on the battlefield was “difficult” but insisted that his forces still occupied positions in Kursk and pursued a foray into the Belgorod region in Russia.
Ukraine’s foray was launched last August to try to create a buffer zone on the border between the two countries that would prevent Russian forces from being deployed on the eastern front of Ukraine.
It comes one day after US President Donald Trump said Russia and Ukraine were “very close to an agreement” on the end of the war, after the talks between his envoy Steve Witkoff and Putin this week.
Trump met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky before Pope Francis funeral to the Vatican on Saturday. Zelensky told the BBC on Friday that he was pressure for a “full and unconditional ceasefire” before any agreement was concluded.
kyiv faced Trump growing pressures to accept territorial concessions in the context of any agreement with Moscow to end the fighting, which could include the abandonment of the Crimean Peninsula which was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.
Ukraine had hoped that he could use the ground he had seized in the Kursk region as a negotiation currency in future peace talks with Russia, which launched all its invasion in 2022 and currently controls around 20% of the internationally recognized territory of Ukraine.
Russia claims that its troops are now on the border with the Sumy of Ukraine region, located next to Kursk.
