President Trump and President Vladimir V. Putin both claimed that Ukrainian forces were surrounded. Ukraine’s top military commander vowed to “hold the line.”

After clinging for more than seven months to a gradually shrinking area, Ukraine has seen its position worsen sharply in the past week.

LONDON/KYIV >> Thousands of Ukrainian troops who stormed into Russia’s Kursk region last summer in a shock incursion are nearly surrounded by Russian forces there, in a major blow to Kyiv which hoped to use its presence there as leverage over Moscow in any peace talks.

Russia's Security Council's Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev attends a meeting of the Council for Science and Education at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in the Moscow region's city of Dubna,

Moscow said on Friday that its forces had recaptured another village in their drive to dislodge Ukrainian forces from their last remaining footholds inside Russia's Kursk region. The defence ministry said Russian troops had retaken Goncharovka,

Russian President Vladimir Putin visited the region for the first time since Kyiv’s lightning incursion and as peace talks gain steam.

A Russian service member places a flag oh the roof of a house in a part of the Kursk region, which was recently retaken by Russia's armed forces in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict, Russia, in this image released.