Ukrainian forces leave path of destruction in Kursk incursion
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Transcript
00:00A statue of Lenin stands in the town square of Suzha, half of his face blown off,
00:04the government building behind him ripped apart.
00:07Evidence of Ukraine's incursion into Russia.
00:11President Volodymyr Zelensky claimed control of Suzha on Thursday after taking the Kremlin
00:15and even his allies by surprise.
00:18As part of a trip organised by Kyiv, journalists were allowed access,
00:22and the scenes they were privy to were ones much more familiar to Ukrainians than to Russians.
00:28Destroyed Russian tanks, punctured road signs and Russian flags line the roads.
00:34But it's not entirely deserted.
00:36Dozens of locals have found refuge in this bomb shelter.
00:39A sign in front of it reads, here are peaceful people in the basement, no soldiers.
00:46Elsewhere in the Kursk region, over 100,000 Russians have chosen to flee.
00:50Many are now staying in evacuee centres like this one, run by volunteers.
00:57Whatever my son took us, that's where we ran.
01:00We would even lay on our stomachs as things went past.
01:04It was extremely scary.
01:06But we survived the night.
01:10In the centre, Russian aid workers distribute basic necessities
01:13and legal advice on navigating state support.
01:17Ukraine has stated it does not want to annex Russian territory.
01:20But it's unclear how far its military will advance,
01:23or how long it'll try to hold onto the land.
01:26We've been more careful since the accident.
01:29You react differently to sirens.
01:31You get right off the streets.
01:33We're taking it more seriously.
01:35It felt like the war was far away, but it's really not.
01:39It's scary how people were injured.
01:41It pains me.
01:44For Ukraine, the incursion comes as a morale boost two and a half years
01:47after Russian forces launched their full-scale offensive.
01:50But for the Kremlin, it's a huge embarrassment,
01:53as it tries to manage the first assault by a foreign army on its territory
01:56since World War Two.