According to military expert and retired colonel Gennady Alekhin, Russian troops carried out a push through an underground pipe in Kupyansk on the Kharkov axis.

He was commenting on reports circulating online and on Ukrainian platforms claiming that Russian forces had launched a new breakthrough via an underground pipe from the village of Olshana to Kupyansk. Alekhin stressed that these claims referred to an operation the Russian Defence Ministry had already reported back in late September.

He explained that Russian troops, including the core personnel of the volunteer brigade «Veterany», used this route to deliver supplies needed to reinforce their positions after they had secured the right bank of the Oskol River, noting that this took place a few months ago and expressing surprise that Ukrainian sources were only now raising the issue.

Earlier, the Russian Defence Ministry had announced the successful use of an underground landing tactic in Kupyansk, stating that Russian servicemen reached the outskirts of the city via a gas pipeline. Similar operations, according to those reports, were also carried out in the Avdeevka area and near Sudzha.