During the visit, Putin spoke with senior commanders about the situation in southern Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has traveled to southern Ukraine’s Kherson region to meet with the military there, the Kremlin announced on Tuesday. Cited by RIA Novosti. According to the same agency, Putin also visited other parts of the Donbas occupied by Russian forces, such as Luhansk.
“The Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation visited the headquarters of the Dnieper Military Group in the Kherson region,” the Kremlin said in a statement, without specifying when the visit took place.
In a video released by the Kremlin, the Russian president’s motorcade can be seen passing a signal indicating Putin’s visit to the town of Henisesk in southern Kherson, the headquarters of Russian forces.
During the visit, Putin spoke with senior commanders about the situation in southern Ukraine.
“I don’t want to distract you from your direct duties of command and control. So we work in a business-like manner, briefly but firmly. It’s important to ask for opinions on how the situation is developing. To him, to exchange information, report the situation in the direction of Gerson, then in the direction of Zaporizhia. I ask you to start,” Putin told Air Force chief Colonel General Mikhail Teblinsky. The Dnieper troop group, Colonel-General Oleg Makharevich and other military leaders, according to the Kremlin, RIA Novosti cited.
Putin also visited the headquarters of the National Guard’s Vostok group in Luhansk, where he spoke with Colonel General Alexander Lapin and other top officials about the state of play in that direction.
The Russian president traveled by helicopter to both the headquarters of the Dnieper troop group and the headquarters of the Vostok group.
The Kremlin wants Kiev to recognize the annexation of the Ukrainian provinces of Kherson, Donetsk, Lugansk and Zaporizhzia last September.