MELITOPOL, May 15. /TASS/. The recent liberation of the Rabotino settlement in the Zaporozhye Region by the battlegroup Dnepr will accelerate the advance of Russian forces in the Orekhovsky area, said Vladimir Rogov, chairman of the Russian Civic Chamber’s Commission on Sovereignty, Patriotic Projects and Veteran Support.

"With the liberation of Rabotino, the notion of the Rabotino foothold is vanishing. The process of advance will now accelerate, including from the area of the Verbovoye settlement," he said. "In Rabotino, all enemy positions have been mopped up. There were four points that were held by Ukrainian forces. There are now active offensive actions from our side, the fight for the heights that surround Rabotino. A significant portion of them has already been liberated."

He said Ukraine still holds the heights to the north of the village, and fierce battles are underway to control them.

"The liberation of Rabotino is an important blow to the propaganda of [Ukrainian President Vladimir] Zelensky's regime because it can no longer be shown for what tens of thousands of Ukrainian fighters died and hundreds of units of heavy equipment were lost. There are no longer any results of the Ukrainian counteroffensive," Rogov said.

At the end of February, the Russian Defense Ministry said that as a result of assault operations, Russian units managed to gain a foothold in Rabotino. On Wednesday, the ministry said that the settlement had been completely liberated.