Almost 300 houses have been damaged in Russia’s Belgorod Region, which shares a border with Ukraine, over the last two and half months, the region’s governor, Vyacheslav Gladkov, revealed on Monday.
Since the beginning of Moscow’s military offensive in Ukraine on February 24, numerous settlements in the southwestern Russian regions of Belgorod, Bryansk, and Kursk have been struck from the Ukrainian side.
“Over the entire period of the special operation, 281 houses in the Belgorod region were damaged, we have already repaired 126,” the governor said during a Q&A session on social media.
Gladkov also revealed that in two villages – Zhuravlevka and Nekhoteevka – the reconstruction works have not started for a reason.
“Why? Because, unfortunately, the shelling continues,” the governor explained.
Last week, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said additional measures would be necessary to strengthen security in the regions bordering Ukraine because of repeated shelling by Kiev’s forces. His remarks followed the news that a Ukrainian artillery strike on Solokhi, a village in Belgorod Region located about 11km from the Ukrainian border, had left seven Russian civilians injured and one dead.
Russia attacked the neighboring state in late February, following Ukraine’s failure to implement the terms of the Minsk agreements, first signed in 2014, and Moscow’s eventual recognition of the Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The German- and French-brokered protocols were designed to give the breakaway regions special status within the Ukrainian state.
The Kremlin has since demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join the US-led NATO military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked and has denied claims it was planning to retake the two republics by force.