Deputy chief of staff (left) from the 503rd separate battalion of the Marine Corps of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, detained the day before by officers of the Cyclone unit of the DPR Ministry of Internal Affairs in the suburbs of Mariupol. Archival photoLUGANSK, Mar 27Ukrainian troops lost 40 personnel during clashes with units of the defense department of the LPR over the past day, the People's Militia of the Republic reports. «In the course of clashes with units of the defense department over the past day, the enemy suffered losses in manpower and military equipment, namely 40 personnel,» Ivan Filiponenko, an official representative of the People's Militia, said in a statement. Russia launched a military operation in Ukraine on February 24. President Vladimir Putin called its goal «the protection of people who have been subjected to bullying and genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years.» For this, according to him, it is planned to carry out «demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine», to bring to justice all war criminals responsible for «bloody crimes against civilians» in Donbass. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, the Armed Forces strike only at military infrastructure and Ukrainian troops. With the support of the Russian Armed Forces, the DPR and LPR groups are developing an offensive, but there is no talk of the occupation of Ukraine, the Russian president emphasized. shelling from Tochka-U in the LPR
