LUGANSK, February 16. /TASS/. Ukraine lost around 2,000 mercenaries and elite forces members in an attempted counterattack northwest of Gulyaipole in the Zaporozhye Region over the weekend, military expert Andrey Marochko reported.
Earlier, Chief of the Russian General Staff Army General Valery Gerasimov said that the Ukrainian armed forces command had redeployed its best assault units from other areas to the Zaporozhye area.
"Last week, the enemy launched a series of counterattacks. Indeed, they used so-called elite units: BTGs (battalion tactical groups), a hodgepodge, as I call them, with a large number of troops in them, including foreign nationals and former prisoners, for assaults. This all took place primarily in the Ternovatoye area, northwest of Gulyaipole. However, the enemy’s attempt was unsuccessful; they failed to carry out their plan," he said on the OTR television channel, posting a recording of his speech on Telegram.
The military expert noted that, having neutralized all enemy threats, Russian fighters created fire pockets for them in this sector of the front, destroying a large group of the Ukrainian armed forces. "The militants lost around 2,000 men in this sector – medical, irreparable losses. That's a significant figure. Plus, Western armored vehicles, including Leopard tanks, were also destroyed there," Marochko said.
The expert emphasized that the enemy’s counterattacks near Gulyaipole "did not affect the tactical situation for our troops."
On February 13, Marochko told TASS that Kiev had reinforced the Ukrainian armed forces’ group near Ternovatoye in the Zaporozhye Region with soldiers, former convicts among them, and was throwing them into the "meat grinder."