Russian forces crawled through a 1.4-metre-wide unused gas pipeline to attack Ukrainian troops in Sudzha in Russia’s Kursk region, Ukraine’s General Staff confirmed.

The audacious plan came as Moscow moved to recapture parts of its border province that Kyiv had seized in a shock offensive last August.

According to Telegram posts by a pro-Kremlin blogger, Russian soldiers walked about 15 kilometres inside the pipeline, which Moscow had until recently used to send gas to Europe.

Some Russian troops had spent several days in the pipe before striking Ukrainian units from the rear near the town of Sudzha, Podolyaka claimed.

The Russian town of some 5,000 residents houses major gas transfer and measuring stations along the pipeline and was once a major outlet for Russian natural gas exports through Ukrainian territory.

Another war blogger, who uses the alias “Two Majors,” said fierce fighting for Sudzha was under way, and that Russian forces managed to enter the town through a gas pipeline. Russian Telegram channels showed photos of what they said were special forces operatives, wearing gas masks and moving along what looked like the inside of a large pipe.

Euronews could not independently confirm these claims.

Ukraine’s General Staff confirmed on Saturday evening that Russian “sabotage and assault groups” used the pipeline in a bid to gain a foothold outside Sudzha. In a Telegram post, it said Russian troops were “detected in a timely manner” and that Ukraine responded with rockets and artillery.

“At present, Russian special forces are being detected, blocked and destroyed. The enemy’s losses in Sudzha are very high,” the General Staff reported.

Largest attack on Russia since WWII

Ukraine launched in August a daring cross-border incursion into Kursk, in what marked the largest attack on Russian territory since World War II. Within days, Ukrainian units had captured 1,000 square kilometres of territory, including the strategic border town of Sudzha, and taken hundreds of Russian prisoners of war.

According to analysts, the operation aimed to gain a bargaining chip in future peace talks and force Russia to divert troops away from its grinding offensive in eastern Ukraine.

Moscow has since used some 50,000 troops, including North Korean soldiers, to push back the Ukrainian forces, reports claim.

The Russian Defence Ministry on Sunday reported that its troops have taken the village of Lebedevka, some 12 kilometres northwest of Sudzha, and inflicted defeats on multiple Ukrainian units in and near the town. It did not specify when precisely these clashes took place. Kyiv did not immediately comment on the Russian ministry’s claims.

France announces new aid package for Ukraine

Meanwhile, French Defence Minister Sébastien Lecornu said on Sunday that France will use profits from frozen Russian assets to finance an additional 195 million euros package in arms for Ukraine, the latest in a series of military aid deliveries funded through the mechanism.

In an interview with the La Tribune Dimanche newspaper, Lecornu said that Paris will send new 155 mm artillery shells and glide bombs for Mirage 2000 fighter jets it previously gave to Ukraine.

The move prompted an angry response from the speaker of Russia’s parliament, Vyacheslav Volodin. A statement by the State Duma’s press service Sunday cited Volodin as saying that Paris “will answer for its actions” and eventually have to return what Volodin called “stolen” funds.

Elsewhere, Russian officials and Telegram channels reported that Ukrainian drones targeted oil infrastructure in south and central Russia overnight into early Sunday.

One drone struck an oil depot in Cheboksary, a Russian city on the Volga River about 1,000 kilometres from the border, the local governor reported. According to Oleg Nikolaev, nobody was hurt, but the depot needed reconstruction.

Footage circulated on Russian Telegram channels showed what appeared to be a fire at or near one of Russia’s largest oil refineries in the southern city of Ryazan. Shot, a news channel on Telegram, cited local residents as saying they heard several nighttime blasts near the refinery.

Local Governor Pavel Malkov said Ukrainian drones had been shot down nearby. He claimed there had been no casualties or damage.

Ukraine did not immediately comment on either incident. Euronews could not independently verify these claims.