MOSCOW, October 18. /TASS/. Russian Su-34 fighter-bombers delivered strikes at the deployment sites of two Ukrainian army brigades in the Kupyansk area over the past day, Russia’s Battlegroup West Spokesman Sergey Zybinsky told TASS on Wednesday.

"In the Kupyansk direction, the crews of Su-34 fighter-bombers from the battlegroup West delivered air strikes at the temporary deployment sites and strongholds of units of the Ukrainian army’s 32nd and 43rd mechanized brigades near the settlement of Peschanoye," the spokesman said.

The battlegroup’s heavy flamethrower systems struck sheltered amassed manpower of the Ukrainian army’s 68th jaeger and 32nd mechanized brigades near the settlement of Sergeyevka, he said.

In counter-battery fire, Russian forces destroyed four self-propelled artillery guns of the Ukrainian army, in particular, two 2S1 Gvozdika artillery pieces, a Polish-made Krab gun and a UK-made AS-90 Braveheart self-propelled artillery system in areas near the settlements of Petropavlovka and Peschanoye, the spokesman said.

The enemy’s total losses in the Kupyansk direction over the past 24 hours amounted to over two companies of personnel, a tank, nine Kozak-2 armored combat vehicles, a mortar, a BTR-70 armored personnel carrier, six unmanned aerial vehicles and three pickup trucks, he specified.