Fighting rages in Russia, Kremlin claims Ukraine gains

Russia says its forces have made important gains in eastern Ukraine while continuing to fend off a new Ukrainian offensive inside the Kursk region of western Russia, the site of a second day of fierce fighting.

The Russian defence ministry said its forces had captured the town of Kurakhove, 32km south of Pokrovsk, a Ukrainian logistics hub towards which Russian forces have been advancing for months.

The ministry said taking Kurakhove, which had held out for many weeks, would enable Russian forces to step up the pace of their advance in Ukraine's Donetsk region.

It also said it had captured Dachenske, a settlement within 8km of Pokrovsk.

Viktor Trehubov, spokesman for Ukraine's Khortytsia group of forces, told Reuters that as of Monday morning, Ukrainian forces were continuing to engage with Russian troops inside Kurakhove.

Ukrainian monitoring group DeepState, which tracks the front line using open sources, showed most of Kurakhove under Russian control.

Both sides are fighting to improve their battlefield positions before Donald Trump, who has pledged to bring a quick end to the nearly three-year-old war, takes office as US president on January 20.

Ukraine's main achievement in the past five months of fighting has been to capture and hold territory inside Russia's Kursk region that could prove a bargaining chip in possible peace talks.

Ukraine has not revealed details of the new offensive it launched in Kursk on Sunday, though a senior Ukrainian official said Russia was "getting what it deserves".

Russia's defence ministry said the Ukrainian advance had been foiled and the main force had been destroyed near the settlement of Berdin, close to a road running northeast towards the city of Kursk.

A senior Russian commander said a further attack was expected.

"We are registering a concentration of enemy equipment in another direction and naturally we understand that will try to strike in this direction. Right now I won't say where," said Major General Apti Alaudinov, commander of a Chechen unit fighting for Russia in Kursk.

Independent military analyst Franz-Stefan Gady said Ukraine was trying to hold its pocket of Kursk for as long as possible, even as Russia continued to push deeper into eastern Ukraine.

"There's a likelihood that we haven't seen the main thrust of this Ukrainian offensive operation just yet," he told Reuters.

"We are essentially talking about platoon-sized, company-sized assaults with fairly limited gains thus far."

It remained to be seen if Ukrainian forces could open up another axis of advance, Gady added.

Ukrainian and international assessments suggest about 11,000 troops from North Korea have been deployed in the Kursk region to support Russian forces.

Russia has neither confirmed nor denied their presence.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Monday more than 1000 North Korean troops had been killed or wounded.

Reuters does not have access to the Kursk war zone and cannot verify casualty figures.

Reacting to the new Ukrainian offensive, the United States, United Kingdom and the European Union reaffirmed their support for Ukraine.

"Ukraine has the right to defend itself, and under international law, this right extends beyond its borders," EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said in a statement to Reuters.

Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron said Ukraine must be "realistic" on territorial concerns in any future negotiations to end the war.

"The Ukrainians must have realistic talks on territorial issues," Macron said in remarks to a meeting of French ambassadors on Monday.

Ukrainian officials have long taken the public position that they intend to regain all territory seized by Russia over the years.

"There will be no quick and easy solution in Ukraine," Macron said.

The US, for its part, should help European allies to convince Russia to come to the negotiating table, he added.

with DPA