- Maj. General Kanamat Botashev, 63, is the tenth Russian general confirmed dead
- He is the highest-ranking Russian pilot to have been killed in the conflict so far
- His Su-25 fighter jet was shot down by a Stinger missile over Luhansk on May 24
- Land Forces of Ukraine say more than 204 Russian planes have been destroyed
- Russia has lost 10 of its generals and more than 40 colonels in bloody fighting
|
Major General Kanamat Botashev was believed to be part of a two ship formation flying low over the Donbass region when his £9m aircraft was struck by a surface to air missile
Video of the final moments of a 63-year-old Russian general shot down and killed by Ukrainian forces has emerged today.
Major General Kanamat Botashev was part of a two-ship formation flying low over the Donbass region when his £9million aircraft was struck by a surface-to-air missile, according to a report of his funeral in Russian outlet Kommersant.
Botashev was shot down in late May as he was trying to help Russian ground troops escape an encirclement.
He was shot down over Ukraine at low level and was unable to eject in time before it crashed.
Major General Kanamat Botashev was believed to be part of a two ship formation flying low over the Donbass region when his £9m aircraft was struck by a surface to air missile
The 63-year-old fighter pilot had previously been retired before returning to front-line duties
The BBC claims that 31 Russian military pilots have lost their lives over Ukraine, although the figure could be higher
Kanamat Botashev was born in 1959 in Karachay-Cherkessia, graduated from the Yeysk Higher Military Aviation Institute and qualified as a fighter-bomber. He rose from lieutenant to general.
The Major General is believed to be the highest-ranked air force casualty to have been killed in Ukraine - and Russian forces have lost at least nine generals in the fighting in Ukraine.
The video of Botashev's final flight was identified by military analyst Rob Lee after the report of his funeral emerged in Russian media.
The 63-year-old fighter pilot had previously been retired before returning to front-line duties.
At least 31 Russian military pilots have lost their lives over Ukraine, although the figure could be higher.
Kanamat Botashev was born in 1959 in Karachay-Cherkessia, graduated from the Yeysk Higher Military Aviation Institute and qualified as a fighter-bomber.
He rose from lieutenant to major general before he was killed in action.
The UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Friday renewed his call for an immediate halt to violence on the 100th day of the war in Ukraine.
The UN chief also called for urgent protection for civilians, unfettered access to provide them with humanitarian aid and safely evacuate those trapped in areas where fighting is taking place, and respect for human rights.
'The conflict has already taken thousands of lives, caused untold destruction, displaced millions of people, resulted in unacceptable violations of human rights and is inflaming a three-dimensional global crisis - food, energy and finance - that is pummeling the most vulnerable people, countries and economies,' Guterres said in a statement Friday.
From the first days of the war, he said the United Nations has been supporting the Ukrainian people trying to deal with its humanitarian impact 'while also drawing attention to the dangers and long-term implications of continued fighting and potential escalation of hostilities for the country, the wider region and the world.'
The secretary-general said the U.N. remains committed to the humanitarian effort, 'but as I have stressed from the beginning, resolving this conflict will require negotiations and dialogue.'
'The sooner the parties engage in good-faith diplomatic efforts to end this war, the better for the sake of Ukraine, Russia and the world,' Guterres said.
The footage of Botashev's last flight comes as Russia lost another colonel in Ukraine just days ago as Vladimir Putin's top brass continues to suffer heavy casualties in his miscalculated invasion.
Lieutenant-colonel Zaur Dimayev, deputy commander of the 4th battalion of the Akhmat Kadyrov special forces regiment, was killed on Tuesday by an artillery barrage in the Donbas region, Telegram channel Baza reported today.
Dimayev was riding in a military SUV through the village of Kamyshevakha, Luhansk province, when it was hit by a Ukrainian shell, according to the site - which is thought to have links to Russian intelligence.
That death brought the total number of Russian colonels killed fighting to at least 49, though no official tally has been published by either Kyiv or Moscow.
Lieutenant-colonel Zaur Dimayev (left), was killed when a Ukrainian shell hit the military SUV he was riding in Luhansk province on Tuesday (pictured right, warlord Ramzan Kadyrov)
The commander, a friend of feared Chechen warlord Ramzan Kadyrov, was said to have been killed instantly alongside his driver.
Two Chechen police officers were also said to have been killed, with another four wounded. Their conditions are not clear.
Chechen special forces - known colloquially as Kadyrovites after their leader - have increasingly been dragged into combat in Ukraine after Russia's military was mauled failing to take Kyiv.
Videos show they were heavily involved in fighting in Mariupol, and have also been involved in trench warfare in Donbas - alongside the armed forces of the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics.
High-ranking commanders have also been dragged into the bloodshed, thought to be because poor organisation has forced them to the front to oversee the fighting.
Just last week, Russia confirmed that Lieutenant colonel Alexander Dosyagayev, 34, believed to be one of the country's top paratroopers, had been killed.
Dosyagayev was a commander of an airborne assault battalion of the 104th paratrooper regiment, which had been recognised as Russia's most elite.
Troops from the 104th were reportedly in Bucha, the scene of alleged rape and torture atrocities committed by Putin’s forces earlier in the war.
Col Vladimir Ivanov, 41, part of the defence ministry’s department of Information and Mass Communication, was also confirmed dead.
Russia is suffering heavy losses amid Putin's ill-planned invasion of Ukraine, as it battles for control of the eastern Donbas region
Russian military vehicles destroyed on a road near the village of Kutuzivka, Kharkiv region, after Ukraine pushed Putin's forces back from the city
Ivanov had been killed back in March but his death was only announced recently, thought to be a deliberate tactic by Russia to keep the true toll of its war hidden.
Though the exact number of Russian forces killed in the fighting is unclear - perhaps even to Putin's commanders - Western intelligence estimates that more than 15,000 have been killed. Kyiv puts the number significantly higher, at more than 30,000.
US officials said Tuesday that some 20 per cent of Russia's combat forces in Ukraine - estimated at 150,000 before the war started - are now out of action. That would mean 30,000 killed or wounded in action.
America also believes that Russia has lost more than 1,000 tanks and is struggling to replace them due to sanctions, perhaps explaining why 50-year-old models were recently filmed heading to the front having been taken out of long-term storage.
Russia is currently fighting a bloody battle for control of the Donbas region, with both sides thought to be suffering heavy losses on a frontline described as 'hell'.
Fighting is currently concentrated around the city of Severodonetsk, one of the last Ukrainian strongholds in Luhansk province, which appears on the verge of falling to Russian forces.
Putin's men will then only need to capture the city of Lysychansk - located just a few hundreds yards away across an industrial zone - to claim ownership of Luhansk.
Heavy fighting is currently underway in the city of Severodonetsk in Ukraine's east, which is in danger of falling to Russia. But Ukrainian counter-attacks are also underway in the south
The cities of Slovyansk and Kramatorsk, around 35 miles west of Lysyschansk, will then be the main obstacles to capturing the whole of the Donbas.
Ukraine has attempted to play down recent Russian advances, saying they provide propaganda for Putin but little tactical advantage.
Kyiv's generals still believe they can ultimately win the war, provided Western allies keep supplying weapons for their troops to push back Russian forces.
It has now been 100 days since Russian tanks rolled across the border and into neighbouring Ukraine on February 24, 2022.
A torrent of gut-wrenching images and clips have emerged since that fateful day: Civilian corpses in the streets of Bucha; a blown-up theatre in Mariupol; the chaos at a Kramatorsk train station in the wake of a Russian missile strike, to name a few.
But those images tell just a small part of the overall picture of Europe's worst armed conflict since World War II.
More than 100,000 Russian troops massed on Ukraine's borders in the days leading up to February 24, but many analysts and commentators dismissed the notion that Russia would launch a full scale invasion into its European neighbour.
Those who did predict such a conflict warned Putin's troops, superior in numbers and equipment, would sweep to victory in a matter of days.
More than three months later and Ukraine's armed forces, driven by a duty to protect their homeland and reinforced by Western supplies and weaponry, have successfully repelled Russia's soldiers from Kyiv and are still fighting their invaders fiercely throughout the Donbas.
Destroyed military equipment of the Russian army in the city of Bucha close to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv
The body of a serviceman is coated in snow next to a destroyed Russian military multiple rocket launcher vehicle on the outskirts of Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Feb. 25, 2022
An explosion tears a hole in the side of an apartment building after a Russian tank fired a rocket in Mariupol, Ukraine, on March 11, 2022
In this photo taken on April 02, 2022 bodies of civilians lie on Yablunska street in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, after Russian army pull back from the city
A view shows the building of a theatre destroyed in the course of Ukraine-Russia conflict, as a word 'children' in Russian is written in large white letters on the pavement, in the southern port city of Mariupol, Ukraine April 10, 2022
The remains of a large rocket with the words 'for our children' in Russian is pictured next to the main building of a train station in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine, that was hit by a rocket attack killing at least 35 people, on April 8, 2022
Russian state media, which from the beginning portrayed the conflict as a 'special military operation' designed to 'demilitarise and de-nazify' Ukraine, was asked by Putin's administration ahead of the 100th day of war 'not to propagate the theme of the operation' and 'not to draw attention to its duration', multiple sources told Russian-Latvian news organisation Meduza.
Britain's MoD said that Putin's forces 'failed to achieve their initial objectives to seize Kyiv and Ukrainian centres of government' and declared 'in order for Russia to achieve any form of success will require continued huge investment of manpower and equipment and is likely to take considerable further time.'
And Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky declared today: 'Victory will be ours,' vowing to expel the Russians from the Donbas region altogether.
Yet the armed conflict has wrought utter havoc and Russia's painstakingly slow but steady progress in seizing more land in eastern Ukraine means there is no end in sight.
Mariana Vishegirskaya stands outside a maternity hospital that was damaged by shelling in Mariupol, Ukraine, March 9, 2022
Bodies of civilians in plastic bags lay in a mass grave in Bucha city, which was the recaptured by the Ukrainian army, Kyiv (Kiev) area, Ukraine, 04 April 2022. More than 410 bodies of killed civilians were carried from the recaptured territory in Kyiv's area for exgumation and expert examination
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks to the press in the town of Bucha, northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, after seeing scores of corpses of Ukrainian civilians slaughtered by withdrawing Russian troops
A woman learns how to use an AK-47 assault rifle during a civilians self-defence course in the outskirts of Lviv, western Ukraine, on March 4, 2022
A woman reacts as she stands in front of a house burning after being shelled in the city of Irpin, outside Kyiv, on March 4, 2022
A man with his bicycle walks between debris outside the destroyed Retroville shopping mall in a residential district, after a Russian attack on the Ukranian capital Kyiv on March 21, 2022
A view of the city of Mariupol on June 2, 2022, amid the ongoing Russian military action in Ukraine
Nobody knows how many combatants or civilians have died, and claims of casualties by government officials and armed forces staff - who are likely to be exaggerating or lowballing their figures in an attempt to favourably shape the narrative of the conflict - are all but impossible to verify.
Foreign government officials, U.N. agencies and independent organisations who carry out the grim task of counting the dead are unable to gain access to many places where people have been killed.
And the Kremlin has released scant information about casualties among its forces and allies, giving no account of civilian deaths in areas under its control.
But even with all those caveats, 'at least tens of thousands' of Ukrainian civilians have died so far, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Thursday in comments to Luxembourg's parliament.
Mayor of Mariupol Vadym Boichenko recently estimated more than 21,000 civilians had died in his city alone after suffering months of constant bombardment, brutality at the hands of Russian occupiers and drastically reduced supplies of food and water.
Severodonetsk, a city in the eastern region of Luhansk that has become the focus of Russia's offensive, has seen roughly 1,500 civilian casualties just in the past few weeks of fighting, according to the city administration chief Oleksandr Striuk.
Ukraine's Armed Forces have not released a death toll for its servicemen and women, but Zelensky said this week that 60 to 100 Ukrainian soldiers are dying every day along the eastern front amid bitter close-quarter fighting in urban centres, with about 500 more wounded.
The Kremlin has only once released official figures for troop deaths, when a general told state media on March 25 that 1,351 soldiers had been killed and 3,825 wounded.
But the Land Forces of Ukraine, which have kept a running tally of Russian losses throughout the war, say more than 30,000 of Putin's soldiers have been killed so far, while Western estimates given in late April put the number at more than 15,000.
Zelensky declared recently that Moscow has lost 'more troops in three months than the Soviet Union lost in 10 years of the war in Afghanistan' - more than 15,000 Soviets were killed between 1979-1989.
Speaking on condition of anonymity Wednesday to discuss intelligence matters, a Western official said Russia is 'still taking casualties, but in smaller numbers.' The official estimated that some 40,000 Russian troops have been wounded.
RUSSIA'S FALLEN GENERALS
General Magomed Tushaev: Chechen special forces leader who had led 'anti-gay purges' killed in an ambush near Hostomel on February 26
Major General Andrei Sukhovetsky: Deputy commander of the 41st Combined Arms Army of the Central Military District killed during a special operation by a sniper on March 4
General Magomed Tushaev (right) was blown up in the early stages of the war by Ukraine after they joined the Russian invasion
Major General Vitaly Gerasimov: First deputy commander of Russia's 41st army who took part in operations in Syria and Crimea, killed in fighting around Kharkiv on March 8
Major General Andrei Kolesnikov: Commander of the 29th Combined Army Army killed on March 11
Major General Vitaly Gerasimov (left) was first deputy commander of Russia's 41st army, taking part in operations in Syria and Crimea. He was killed in fighting around Kharkiv on March 8
Major General Oleg Mityaev, died fighting near the city of Mariupol on 16 March
Lt Gen Andrey Mordvichev, killed in the Kherson region on March 19
Lt Gen Yakov Rezantsev, commander of Russia's 49th combined army, was killed in a strike near the southern city of Kherson on March 25
Major General Vladimir Frolov was deputy commander of the 8th Guards Army in east Ukraine
Major General Kanamat Botashev (retired) was killed flying fighter jets for a private military contractor in Donbas last week
Lt Gen Yakov Rezantsev, commander of Russia's 49th combined army (left) killed near the southern city of Kherson, and Major General Vladimir Frolov (right)
Retired Major General Kanamat Botashev, 63, was killed flying fighter jets for a private military contractor in Ukraine
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10884161/VIDEO-Russian-general-shot-Ukraine.html
No comments:
Post a Comment