And in a sign that military discipline is breaking down, a new video that appears to be showing Russian troops looting shops in the region under Ukrainian attack has emerged on social media channels.
One clip shows an apparent robbery taking place on August 17 at a mobile phone store in the village of Glushkovo.
Soldiers in Russian military uniforms can be seen breaking shop windows for at least half an hour and taking out equipment.
The images were captured by CCTV cameras at a Megfon store, a chain of mobile phone shops in Russia.
The troops appear to be Chechen soldiers, presumably serving as part of the Akhmat battalion that has been sent to the region to repel the Ukrainian incursion.
In one scene, a soldier is filmed clearing out the shelves of the phone shop, as he fills his boots with the precious bounty.
Ukraine claims to have killed and captured a number of Chechen fighters in the Kursk region, presumably attached to the “Kadyrovite” Akhmat special forces.
On August 11, a Ukrainian project that provides support to surrendering Russian troops published a video of prisoners of war (POWs), three of whom claimed to have come from Grozny, the capital of Russia’s Chechen republic.
Ukraine’s 225th Separate Assault Battalion also published a photo of multiple recovered Russian military identity documents on August 13.
Some seemed to belong to members of Chechen units, though it added that identification of the fighters had been “complicated by the condition of the bodies.”
Apti Alaudinov, commander of the Akhmat special forces, initially tried to deny reports that members of his units had been captured.
He said:“A Chechen who is captured is no longer a Kadyrovite. For a Chechen, there is nothing more shameful than being captured.”