MELITOPOL, August 3. /TASS/. The Ukrainian military deployed some 8,000 troops to the area of Orekhov and Gulyaipole in the Zaporozhye direction, Vladimir Rogov, chairman of the We Are Together with Russia public movement, told TASS on Thursday.
"This number of militants of Ukrainian armed formations moved towards our positions through Pavlograd and Dnepropetrovsk precisely in the Zaporozhye direction towards the area of Orekhov and Gulyaipole… Today these 8,000 are already there, in the Orekhov-Gulyaipole area and their unit cohesion measures are now underway," the regional official said.
In that frontline area, the enemy has been sparing its armor lately, Rogov said.
"They spare equipment very much or prepare it for something else. The equipment is present but does not move to combat positions. At best, it operates from shielded firing positions," he said.
Acting Zaporozhye Region Governor Yevgeny Balitsky said earlier on Thursday that last night Russian forces had delivered artillery fire on three Ukrainian assault brigades being amassed for an offensive near Malaya Tokmachka and Novopokrovka. He said that the enemy had lost actually the entire assault brigades’ personnel.
As the Russian Defense Ministry reported, the Ukrainian army has been making unsuccessful offensive attempts since June 4. Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu reported on July 11 that the Ukrainian army’s losses had exceeded 26,000 since Kiev launched its counter-offensive. Russian President Vladimir Putin stressed that Ukrainian troops had failed to achieve any success in any of the frontline areas.