Russia suffers heavy losses in the Ukraine war.
Kiev finds more Chinese components in Russian weapons.
Belarus threatens the West with nuclear weapons.
The news ticker.
Russia's elite fighters decimated?
95 percent could be dead
Wounded
and
dead
: Leaks indicate heavy casualties on both sides
Dead
soldiers
in the
Ukraine war
: Kremlin no longer gives numbers
Here you can read current developments from the Ukraine conflict.
The processed information on the losses of the armies involved in the Ukraine war comes partly from the warring parties from Russia or Ukraine.
They can therefore not be independently checked in part.
Update from April 14, 8:00 p.m .:
After the arrest in the data leak scandal, US President Joe Biden instructed the military and secret services to take additional measures to protect sensitive information.
Biden announced on Friday that the dissemination of information about national defense should be further restricted.
One is still in the process of determining the content value of the secret documents published on the Internet.
The USA coordinated closely with partners and allies.
Biden commended law enforcement for "acting swiftly."
Rocket attack in eastern Ukraine: at least five people killed
Update from April 14, 7:19 p.m .:
According to regional governor Pavlo Kyrylenko, at least five people were killed in a rocket attack in Slowiansk in eastern Ukraine.
At least 15 were injured.
An S-300 missile damaged five apartment buildings and five private houses.
Seven people are being searched for in the rubble.
Up to 95 percent of elite Russian fighters killed in Ukraine?
Update from April 14, 7:09 p.m.:
Were up to 95 percent of Russian elite fighters killed in Ukraine?
This is what the
Washington Post
writes , citing American military estimates and experts, as well as satellite images that surfaced among documents leaked by the Pentagon.
Russian military commanders therefore often used special forces brigades as ordinary infantrymen in the first months after the invasion.
As a result, elite units, which take at least four years to train, were almost completely defeated.
Typically, Spetsnaz operatives are assigned high-risk undercover missions — including an “obvious” order to kidnap Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The high casualties have deprived the Russian army of the possibility of special operations, for which such units are intended.
It could be about a decade before Russia actually rebuilds combat-ready units, Pentagon documents show.
It states: Of the five separate Russian special operations brigades that returned from combat operations in Ukraine in late summer 2022, all but one unit suffered significant casualties.
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Losses for Russia: 95 percent of Russian fighters were apparently killed in Ukraine
© IMAGO/Tsitsagi Nikita
More and more Chinese components in Russian weapon systems
Update from April 14, 5:41 p.m .:
Ukraine says it is finding more and more Chinese components in Russian weapon systems.
The composition of the weapons seized on the battlefield has changed, government adviser Wladyslaw Wlasiuk told
Reuters
news agency via video link.
"The trend is now towards fewer components from Western production, but more components - not difficult to guess which country," said President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's adviser on sanctions policy.
"Of course China."
+
Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping greet each other with a handshake.
© Alexey Maishev/Pool Sputnik Kremlin/AP/dpa
Ukraine war: Belarus threatens West with nuclear weapons: "Will be the next step"
Update from April 14, 2:55 p.m .:
The Defense Minister of Belarus threatened to deploy strategic nuclear weapons during an unannounced maneuver by the Belarusian army.
“If necessary, we will also have strategic nuclear weapons.
We are already dealing with the preparation of existing launch pads," said Viktor Chrenin, according to media reports, at a military training area.
If the West's hostile rhetoric persists, that will be "the next step," the general said.
Belarus itself has no nuclear weapons.
At the end of March, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that tactical nuclear weapons would be stationed in the former Soviet republic.
Pictures of the Ukraine war: great horror and small moments of happiness
Pictures of the Ukraine war: great horror and small moments of happiness
New data on Russian losses: dozens of bodies exchanged
Update from April 14, 1:25 p.m .:
Ukraine and Russia have again exchanged the bodies of dozens of killed soldiers.
"Ukraine has recovered the bodies of another 82 fallen defenders," the ministry in Kiev said on Telegram.
It was not disclosed how many dead the Russian side received.
A confirmation from Moscow was still pending.
According to the authorities, around 800 bodies have been handed over to the Ukrainian side since the start of the Ukraine war almost 14 months ago.
Only estimates exist for the total number of Ukrainian victims.
Kiev regards the numbers as a state secret.
Russia also gives little information on its losses.
Ukraine War: Leaks indicate heavy casualties on both sides
Update from April 14, 12:15 p.m .:
Secret US documents containing information on arms deliveries and assessments of what happened in the Ukraine war have been circulating on the Internet for weeks.
The leaks also show, among other things, that US estimates put the number of Russian casualties (dead and wounded) between 189,500 and 223,000.
Of these, 35,500 to 43,000 soldiers are said to have been killed in action.
The losses for Ukraine are therefore between 124,500 and 131,000.
Another number is also mentioned in the documents.
This is of particular interest as it comes from the Russian domestic secret service FSB.
According to this, almost 110,000 Russian soldiers are said to have been killed or wounded by February.
At the same time, the FSB accuses the Ministry of Defense of not counting the deaths of the Russian National Guard or Wagner mercenaries.
In addition, the documents seem to confirm the suspicion that the military deliberately withheld from Russian President Vladimir Putin the true extent of Russian losses.
Russia suffers heavy losses in the Ukraine war
First report from April 14:
Moscow - Russia has to accept heavy losses in the Ukraine war.
Publicly available data suggests that at least 19,688 Russian soldiers have died in combat so far.
This is according to figures regularly published by the
BBC
's Russian service and the independent Russian media outlet
Mediazona
.
The data is based solely on confirmed sources that provide the names of the dead.
This includes social media posts from relatives, reports in local media and statements from regional authorities.
However, since only publicly available reports can be verified, the actual death toll is likely to be significantly higher.
In addition, no information can be given about missing or captured soldiers.
For comparison: According to official figures, 14,453 Soviet soldiers died in the ten-year war in Afghanistan from 1979 to 1989, and 53,753 soldiers were wounded at the time.
Russia's losses in the Ukraine war: numerous officers among the victims
At the top of the casualty list are still the fighters who were recruited by the Wagner group and used in the battle for the strategically important small town of Bakhmut.
So far, the names of 1,100 soldiers who died there are known.
However, there are fewer casualties among voluntary mercenaries than among the prisoners drafted by Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin.
In all, Mediazona
has
identified the names of 1,783 mobilized conscripts who have died in the war so far.
There are heavy losses, especially in the higher ranks.
The Russian army is said to have lost more than 2,000 officers since the beginning of hostilities.
In the past two weeks alone,
Mediazona
has confirmed the deaths of nine Russian officers with the rank of lieutenant colonel or higher.
As a rule, these are young and inexperienced military personnel who have only recently been promoted.
220 of them had the rank of lieutenant colonel or higher, so five major generals died at the top level:
Vladimir Frolov
Roman Kutuzov
Andrei Sukhovetsky
Dmitry Ulyanov
Andrei Paly
The Twitter account "KilledInUkraine" also assumes that more than 2,000 Russian officers died in the Ukraine war.
We are talking about 2,055 victims here.
Based on publicly available data from Russia, the Ukrainian armed forces eliminated at least 2,055 Russian officers as of April 13, 2023. Confirmations are made via funeral notices, obituaries and news sites.
Names, photos and sources: https://t.co/KPk6K7C5tR pic.twitter.com/FpciMqc9cc
— KIU • Russian Officers killed in Ukraine 🇨🇿🇺🇦 (@KilledInUkraine) April 13, 2023
Losses for Russia: Kremlin no longer gives numbers
The Kremlin itself has not released any figures on its own losses since September.
Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu then gave the figure of 5,937 military personnel killed.
However, the British Ministry of Defense reported on February 17 that Russian troops and Wagner mercenaries may have suffered as many as 200,000 casualties since the start of the Ukraine war.
The ministry evaluated up to 60,000 soldiers in February.
The Ukrainian General Staff spoke of more than 181,000 "liquidated Russian soldiers" on April 14.
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Rubric list image: © IMAGO/Tsitsagi Nikita
