Russia has withdrawn troops from southern Ukraine and moved them back to its own territory as it tries to fend off an escalating incursion by Kiev, a Ukrainian official said Tuesday, according to Politico.

Ukraine’s ongoing surprise attack has caused consternation in Moscow and anger in Vladimir Putinas Kiev managed to capture dozens of settlements and large areas in the Kursk and Belgorod regions in the south of Russia.

“Russia has moved some of its units that were in Zaporizhia and Kherson” Dmytro Lykhoviy, a spokesman for the Ukrainian military, told Politico.

The Kremlin attacked Zaporizhia and Kherson in the first days of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in early 2022. Politico reports that it could not confirm how many troops were moved back to Russia’s borders, though Lykhoviy said in a relatively “small number”.

However, in an attempt to put a brake on the Ukrainian advance, Russian troops are continuing their offensive in Pokrovsk and other places in the Donetsk region of Ukraine – according to the General Staff of the Ukrainian army – in one of the hot spots, where Russia is gaining ground.

However, Lykhoviy, speaking on Ukrainian television, also stated that Russia is transporting its personnel and “in other areas, including Kursk.”

In a tense meeting held on Monday in Russia, local authorities described to an enraged Putin how Ukrainian forces managed last week to push through the few Russian troops in the south, leading more than 200,000 people to mass evacuations.

While Ukraine is occupying Russian lands, Russian commanders initially downplayed the attackinsisting that the military had the situation under control. But a week later the Ukrainians have occupied 1,000 square kilometers of Russian territory.

In Moscow on Monday, a Putin ally blamed the Ukrainian incursion on the Russian military, saying it was not prepared to prevent a Ukrainian attack, adding that Russian border troops had learned last of the ongoing Ukrainian offensive, leaving him little time to react. .