Kiev loses 8,000 soldiers, mercenaries in special op zone over past week — military expert

LUGANSK, May 4. /TASS/. Last week’s casualties inflicted on the Ukrainian military in the special military operation zone totaled about 8,000 killed and wounded, including foreign mercenaries, military expert Andrey Marochko reported. "Enemy casualties and irreplaceable losses from April 25 to May 1 totaled around 8,010 Ukrainian militants and mercenaries. Ukrainian armed formations suffered the heaviest casualties in the responsibility zone of the Battlegroup Center, operating along the western borders of the Donetsk People’s Republic and in the Dnepropetrovsk Region," he wrote on his VK page after analyzing data from the Russian Ministry of Defense. Marochko added that over the past week, Russian troops had also destroyed a tank, three multiple rocket launchers, two Buk-M1 air defense missile systems, 52 field artillery guns, 42 electronic warfare and counter-battery stations, more than 500 combat vehicles, as well as nearly 2,700 enemy UAVs.