MOSCOW, September 7. /TASS/. Direct irrecoverable losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces could exceed 500,000 people by the end of 2023, the country’s former Prime Minister, Nikolay Azarov, said on Mriya television.

"Direct KIA losses are 350,000-450,000 and the obvious forecast is that the half-million mark will be surpassed by the end of the year. And what is half a million for Ukraine? It is the population of a major regional center," he said. "And these are only direct losses. They deliberately record people that were killed as missing in order not to pay welfare," he said.

The Russian Defense Ministry estimates that during the botched summer counteroffensive alone Ukrainian forces lost more than 66,000 personnel and 7,600 weapons. Over the past month alone, Russian troops have hit 34 command posts of Ukraine’s operational-tactical chain of command with precision strikes.