Russian President Vladimir Putin traveled to the Kherson and Luhansk regions, in southern and eastern Ukraine respectively, to meet the soldiers deployed there as part of the Russian operation launched there more than a year, the Kremlin announced on Tuesday.
The Kremlin statement does not specify when this trip took place but indicates that the Russian president congratulated the military in the Kherson and Lugansk regions on the occasion of the Orthodox Easter holiday, which was celebrated on Sunday, and their offered "
copies of the icons
".
First trip since the war
"
The Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation visited the General Staff of the Dnieper Military Grouping
" in the Kherson region, the statement said.
This is Vladimir Putin's first trip to the Kherson region since the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine in February 2022.
Vladimir Putin met there with the Commander of the Russian Airborne Forces, General Mikhail Teplinsky and other senior military officials to discuss the situation in the Kherson and Zaporizhia regions, which Russia claimed to be annexed last September. .
“
It is important for me to hear your opinion on the situation, to listen to you, to exchange information
,” said the Russian president, according to a video released by the Kremlin.
Read alsoUkrainian counter-offensive: why all eyes are on the Zaporizhia region
The Russian army had abandoned the city of Kherson, capital of the eponymous region, in November 2022 to retreat to the other side of the Dnieper.
Vladimir Putin also traveled to the Lugansk region in eastern Ukraine, also a first, to meet with soldiers from the Russian National Guard staff deployed there, according to the Kremlin.
In March, Vladimir Putin had already made surprise visits to Crimea, a peninsula annexed by Russia in 2014, and to Mariupol, a Ukrainian port city besieged for months and taken by the Russian army in May 2022.
