A senior official of Russia's military says it has retaken more than 60 percent of areas captured by Ukraine in the western Russian region of Kursk.



Colonel General Sergei Rudskoi, head of the General Staff's main operational directorate, gave an interview to Krasnaya Zvezda, a newspaper of Russia's defense ministry. It was released on Thursday.



Rudskoi said Russian forces have retaken over 800 square kilometers, or about 64 percent, of Ukrainian-controlled land in Kursk. He said Russia now fully holds the initiative in the region.



The Ukrainian military has been engaging in a cross-border incursion into Kursk since last August.



Rudskoi also discussed situations in four Ukrainian regions that Russia claimed to have annexed in 2022.



The official said Russian forces have cleared "Ukrainian nationalists" from some 75 percent of areas in Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. He said less than 1 percent of Luhansk remains to be "liberated."



Rudskoi said Ukraine has largely lost the ability to produce necessary weapons, equipment and ammunition. He added that the country also cannot compensate for its high losses through mobilization.



Rudskoi stressed that Ukraine will no longer be able to significantly change the situation on the battlefield.