KURSK, October 21. /TASS/. The Ukrainian armed forces have lost the chance to break through to the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), a Russian commander of the Akhmat special forces unit said.

"Let me put it this way: Ukraine has already lost the only chance to break through to the nuclear power plant in the first days [of the invasion], when it tried to implement the so-called blitzkrieg plan to give us a nuclear ultimatum," the commander told TASS.

He pointed out that the Russian armed forces quickly pulled combat-ready units to this area.

"A lot of them [Ukrainian servicemen] came in, there are already more than 20,000 of them buried here, not counting hundreds of pieces of equipment. <...> They have already lost all their chances. Now it's just a show to save face. Moreover, it leads to the fact that simply young Ukrainians are being sacrificed to the ambitions of their ‘expired’ president," the commander said.

The Ukrainian armed forces attacked Russia’s Kursk Region on August 6. Residents of border areas are being evacuated to safe territories. According to the Defense Ministry, Kiev has lost up more than 25,000 servicemen since the beginning of hostilities in the Kursk area. The operation to destroy the Ukrainian armed formations continues.