Russian leader Vladimir Putin claimed June 28 that Ukrainian forces were “nearly encircled” near the “Stary Oskol River,” though Stary Oskol is a city in Russia’s Belgorod Oblast, more than 100 kilometers from the Ukrainian border.
“There is a mixed enemy grouping of about 5,000 personnel that has effectively been blocked by our units on the left bank of the Stary Oskol River. It is pressed against the river,” Putin said in an interview with the Russian propaganda outlet Vesti.
“From above, Russia’s 1st Tank Army is pressing the enemy from the north, the 3rd Motorized Rifle Division from the east, and the 144th Division from the south,” he said.
Putin claimed that Russian forces were about 2 kilometers away from fully encircling the Ukrainian units.
Serhii Sternenko, an adviser to Ukraine’s defense minister and civic activist, pointed out that Stary Oskol is a city in Russia’s Belgorod Oblast and the administrative center of the Starooskolsky urban district.
“Putin has completely lost touch with reality. He said Ukrainian forces were nearly encircled near Stary Oskol. It is a city in Belgorod Oblast, 100 kilometers from the border,” Sternenko wrote.
No river called Stary Oskol exists. The Oskil River flows through Russia and Ukraine’s Kharkiv Oblast. It is the largest left-bank tributary of the Siverskyi Donets and belongs to the Don River basin.
Putin was likely referring to the Oskil River while commenting on the situation in Kharkiv Oblast, though there has been no...
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