During a press conference in Kyiv, Zelenskiy explained that he could not reveal the number of injured soldiers as it could assist Russian military strategy. “31,000 of our troops have fallen in the conflict. Not 300,000, not 150,000... Putin is not telling the truth there... However, the loss is significantly large for us.”
Since the close of 2022, Ukraine has avoided specifying its military fatalities, a period after presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak reported that 13,000 Ukrainian soldiers had died since the beginning of the invasion on February 24. The topic of battlefield losses is particularly delicate in a nation that is overhauling its approach to mobilizing civilians into the military, aiming to rejuvenate its forces following a counteroffensive last year that failed to penetrate Russian defenses.
At the same press conference, Volodymyr Zelensky once again urged the US Congress to unblock the funds that his country needs.
