President Vladimir Putin has visited occupied territories of Ukraine, the Kremlin says. There, among other things, he is said to have met Russian commanders. The visit is Putin’s second in Ukraine since the start of the war. Fragmentary footage from the Kremlin, which has not yet been verified by independent sources, shows Putin wandering around various military installations in occupied areas of Ukraine. The Russian president has traveled to a military headquarters in the “Kherson direction,” as an official statement puts it. He is then said to have visited forces in occupied Luhansk in the east. There he is said to have been informed about how the invasion is progressing. “Important to me” Russia still controls parts of the Ukrainian region of Kherson, but the invasion forces were forced out of the city of the same name last fall. It is located on the Dnieper River, which has been a front line in the south for several months now. At the meeting with the commanders of the Dnieper forces, Putin said he “does not want to distract them” from their duties, but that it is “important for me to hear your views on how the situation is developing,” the Kremlin said. On the occasion of the Orthodox Easter, the president is said to have also handed over pictures of saints to the various commanders he met. Two visits in a short time The information about Putin’s visit comes almost exactly one month after his last visit to occupied land. Then the president appeared in Mariupol, the city in southeastern Ukraine that was bombed to pieces during the Russian siege last spring. It is said to have been his first visit to Ukraine since the full-scale invasion began in February 2022. As with this second visit, the Kremlin claims that it took place without any major preparations. In Mariupol, Putin was seen driving a car through the city’s central streets in the evening or night darkness – near, but without passing, several sites where some of the worst war crimes to date have taken place.
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