By The Associated Press
Russia is planning to relocate approximately 9,000 children from a border area because Ukraine has been continuously bombing it. An official stated on Tuesday that this reflects Kyiv's increased focus on attacking targets behind the front line that has remained unchanged in recent months.
The children will be taken from the Belgorod region further east, away from the Ukraine border, as stated by the governor of the region, Vyacheslev Gladkov.
This decision comes after Russian President Vladimir Putin mentioned that the Kremlin aims to establish a buffer zone to safeguard border areas from Ukrainian attacks and cross-border raids, which have been ongoing for over two years.
Ukraine has been using its long-range weapons to target oil facilities and storage depots deep inside Russia, while also trying to unsettle the Russian border areas in order to exert political pressure on Putin.
Furthermore, opponents of Putin and the Kremlin based in Ukraine have conducted cross-border raids. Putin discussed these incursions during a meeting on Tuesday with top officials of the Federal Security Service, the FSB.
Civilian areas in Belgorod have been hit hard during the conflict. According to Gladkov, 16 people died and 98 were wounded just in the past week. In response, he ordered the closure of shopping malls until Monday and schools until Tuesday due to the security situation.
This planned evacuation of children is one of the largest publicly announced in the Belgorod region since the war started in February 2022. Last June, around 1,000 people, including children and their families, were moved to other Russian regions, and there have been occasional reports of evacuations over the past year.
It is unclear whether adults will accompany the children during this latest evacuation order, which means the total number of evacuees could be much higher.
Gladkov said about 600 people were staying in temporary accommodations on Monday after being evacuated from their homes.
Gladkov reported that three people, including a 14-year-old who had part of a limb amputated, were injured on Tuesday in an aerial attack from Ukraine on the Belgorod region. The 14-year-old's mother was also seriously hurt in the attack.
The day before, Gladkov stated that four members of the same family died in an attack on the village of Nikolskoe in Belgorod. A grandmother, mother, her partner, and 17-year-old son were killed after a missile hit their house.
It has not been possible to independently verify either side’s battlefield claims.
The Russian defense ministry said that two Ukrainian drones were shot down over Belgorod and another over the neighboring Voronezh region overnight. It provided no details of any damage or injuries.
Meanwhile, Russia used S-300 missiles to attack the city of Selydove in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine. Four people were wounded, and homes and vehicles were damaged, according to the regional prosecutor’s office.
According to Vadym Filashkin, the regional governor, Russian attacks in the Donetsk region on Monday killed one person and injured another.
The Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy asked Ukraine's Western allies on Tuesday to quickly provide more air defense systems and showed how much of a challenge Kyiv's forces are facing. He mentioned that Russia has already used 130 missiles, over 320 Shahed drones, and almost 900 guided air bombs to attack different parts of Ukraine this month.
According to Zelenskyy, Ukraine has increased its defense production and aims to reach levels not seen since gaining independence in 1991 after the collapse of the Soviet Union. However, it still heavily depends on Western support, which has decreased in recent months.
On Tuesday, Adm. Alexander Moiseyev was introduced as the new acting head of the Russian navy during a ceremony at a naval base in Kronstadt, in the Gulf of Finland. Last week, Russian media reported that the previous navy chief, Adm. Nikolai Yevmenov, was fired and replaced by Moiseyev, who was the commander of the navy's northern fleet.
Yevmenov's replacement came after successful attacks by Ukrainian drones and missiles on the Russian Black Sea fleet, which led Moscow to limit its naval operations in the region.
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