Second Russian general killed, Ukraine Defense Ministry claims
New Delhi: A Russian general has been killed in fighting around Kharkiv, Ukrainian intelligence has claimed, which would make him the second general the Russian army has lost in Ukraine in a week.
The intelligence arm of the Ukrainian defense ministry said Maj Gen Vitaly Gerasimov, chief of staff of the 41st Army, had been killed outside the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, along with other senior officers.
The ministry also broadcast what it claimed was a conversation between two Russian FSB officers discussing the death and complaining that their secure communications were no longer functioning inside Ukraine.
The investigative journalism agency said it had confirmed Gerasimov’s death with a Russian source. Its executive director, Christo Grozev, said they had also identified the senior FSB officer in the intercepted conversation.
If confirmed, Gerasimov would be the second Russian general from the 41st Army to die within a week in Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. At the beginning of March, its deputy commander, Major General Andrei Sukhovetsky, was confirmed to have been killed by Russian media.
