Ukraine's ambassador tells U.N. the 'demilitarization of Russia is well under way'

Sergiy Kyslytsya
(Image credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed his invasion of Ukraine sought only the "demilitarization and de-Nazification" of Russia's smaller neighbor. More than a month into the invasion, Ukraine's United Nations ambassador, Sergiy Kyslytsya, used the same phrase to highlight Russia's losses in the war.

The "demilitarization of Russia is well under way," Kyslytsya told the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday. He claimed Russia has lost more than 17,000 military personnel since invading, plus more than 1,700 armored vehicles and about 600 tanks, in "an unprecedented blow to Moscow, where the numbers of Soviet losses in Afghanistan pale in comparison." Russia's loss of 15,000 or more troops over a decade in Afghanistan helped lead to the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Russia recently claimed only 1,351 of its troops have died in Ukraine, while NATO put the number of Russian dead last week at between 7,000 and 14,000. "Each side has an incentive to inflate the damage they do, and deflate the damage that's been done to them," Stephen Saideman, a professor at Carleton University and director of the Canadian Defense and Security Network, tells CBC News. "It's part of every war to do that."

But Sean Maloney, a professor of military history at Canada's Royal Military College, told CBC News he is "confident, with the sources that I have, that the number of Russians killed in action is above 15,000," including 31 senior Russian military officers and many highly trained soldiers. The Russians "don't care about their personnel, their vehicles are not equipped to protect their people," he said. "I have not seen an armored ambulance this entire war."

Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.