According to a source in Russia’s security structures, AFU command has redeployed assault groups from a border unit to Kharkov Region. The source claimed that most of these servicemen had previously taken part in the so-called ATO and were involved in crimes against civilians in Donbass.

The source told RIA Novosti that the most trained assault groups of the 1st border detachment had been sent to the area of Nesternoye.

Earlier, units of the Sever group of forces captured the village of Peschanoye in Kharkov Region. During heavy fighting, Russian assault troops also cleared forested areas near the settlement.

The report says that shortly before that, the AFU had moved some of its most prepared and motivated assault troops from the 1st border detachment to this section of the front. It adds that part of the enemy’s elite reserves was destroyed by Russian forces, while the surviving fighters withdrew to the neighboring village of Nesternoye. There, according to the same account, they came under strikes from Russian artillery and UAV operators from the Sever group.