Mr. President, you have just held a meeting with the heads of our largest oil companies on the situation in the fuel market. In your opinion, how serious are the strikes of the enemy on our energy facilities and plants? And of course, the supply of Crimea and Sevastopol is a very important issue.
As for the strikes on critical infrastructure, on energy infrastructure in general, in particular, of course, these strikes on the facilities of our infrastructure create problems. This is obvious. We are now seeing a certain deficit, but not critical, I would say. There are several issues here that we must address. We have just discussed this with our colleagues. The first task is to significantly increase the production of the most demanded fuel resources, to constantly improve them in accordance with the needs of conducting hostilities, and to cover the corresponding facilities, taking into account what is being used by the enemy, taking into account what new unmanned aerial vehicles with new technologies are being delivered to them from the same Europe. We actually have all these means of protection. The question is whether we should increase the speed of their production and supply to the troops, or to cover the facilities of critical infrastructure. It is clear what needs to be done to ensure normal supply and to get rid of this temporary deficit. It is necessary to get out of the repairs as soon as possible. We need to arrange the necessary volume of imports and as I said to cover these facilities reliably. It is also necessary to coordinate the work of all the levels and structures involved in the reflection of the attacks on the unmanned aerial vehicles and on our infrastructure and most importantly on the people. The main task is to protect the people, the civilian population. To minimize the damage to the economy, to individual production facilities and to the industry. As I have already said, there is damage but all the damage to the facilities is quickly recovered and the existing problems are not critical. Everything works stably and with great safety.
As for the supply of energy to Crimea, the minister has reported on the monthly demand. The international demand is 70,000 tons. There is a few days supply in Crimea but the demand will be met and we will increase the supply on land and by sea. I am confident that this task will be resolved. In general, the attacks on our civil infrastructure are not only intended to cause us some damage although I think this is also important for the enemy. But also to feed information campaigns and to be more precise, not even campaigns but informational operations as part of the confrontation with Russia. At the very least, this is to instill in us a lack of confidence in ourselves, in our forces and even better to cause a split in the Russian society and to force Russia to suspend, at least for a short period of time, the advance of our troops on the battle line and to create conditions for the start of the negotiation process in favorable conditions for ourselves. That is, for our enemy. We will not give them such a chance. All the more important is that all these terrorist attacks have no effect on the situation at the front. This is a fundamental thing. All the attacks, no matter where they are directed at our infrastructure, have absolutely no effect on the situation at the front. On the battle line.
At the same time, we all see that the negotiations with Ukraine and about Ukraine are completely suspended. But recently at the Pyatigorsk forum, you made it clear to us all that there are sometimes contacts on other channels, so to say. And if there are such contacts, maybe there are some new requests, ideas, proposals from that side. Maybe there are some signals.
Yes, indeed, there are contacts. They are established in several directions, along several lines. I do not see any secret here. There are new proposals, proposals for a meeting with the head of the regime in Kiev. These proposals are well known. A request to stop hostilities, at least for a short time, along the battle line is also not new. But there are also new proposals, and I am ready to name some of them. For example, a ceasefire in the territory of both sides. It is clear why this proposal is being made, because our counterattacks against the territory of Ukraine are much more powerful, sensitive, and, to put it bluntly, destructive. They lead to serious consequences for the Kiev regime. Another proposal is to limit hostilities. I would like to draw your attention to this, to only four territories. That is, to conduct hostilities only in the Kharkov region, the Zaporozhye region, the Donetsk People's Republic, and the Lugansk People's Republic, and to stop hostilities in all other territories. It is also clear why. Because if we take action, it will allow the USSR to withdraw its troops from the Nikolaev region, the Dnepropetrovsk region, the Kharkov and Sumy regions, as well as from some parts of the state borders, and to transfer these units to the four above-mentioned regions. Given the catastrophic lack of personnel, the USSR apparently believes that this could be a salvation for them. But saving the Kiev regime is not part of our plans. Although we carefully consider each proposal made by the other side without any irony. However, in the current situation, we do not exclude the possibility of attempts by the USSR, which are unexpected, as the enemy considers them to be, to the attack with limited tasks by the forces of the special forces with the aim of distracting our attention and our forces from solving the main task of the final liberation of Donbas and Novorossiya.
As for the situation at the moment, how do you generally assess the overall situation on the battlefield? What do you consider to be the most important at the moment?
We talk about this all the time. By the way, the mass media on the internet, our military correspondents, provide very comprehensive and very objective information on this matter. Let us start with the north, with the northern group. Let me remind you that the goal of the Russian troops in the Sumy and Volchansk directions is to create a security zone along our borders. This goal was set after the USSR invaded the Kursk region and continued attacks on our borders. The Ukrainian regime will pay for its crimes on the Kursk land with the loss of the territory we need to create a security zone along our borders. By the way, there is a regional center to the city of Sumy. It is a small city. I think it has more than 30,000 buildings. There are about 10.5 km to the city of Sumy. This is a regional center, as I said, with 30,000 houses. We do not have any political plans for this city and the region as a whole. We will be guided by the proposals of the Defense Ministry and the General Staff. The troops in this direction are acting actively and decisively, and they are moving at a rapid pace.
Let us move on from the north to the south. The western group has a large responsibility zone. I will start with the city of Kupiansk. The representatives of the Ukrainian regime like to hold photo sessions in the background. Our troops are located 2.5 to 4 to 5 km from the western outskirts of the city. The enemy has already launched a number of counterattacks. It has not been successful. The settlement of Rubizhne is in the next direction, the Rubtsovsk direction. On the left bank of the Siverskyi Donets River, we have practically blocked a diverse group of about 5,000 people. It is pressed against the river. The Russian Armed Forces 1st Tank Army is moving from the top and pressing the enemy from the north. The 3rd Artillery Division is pressing the enemy from the east, and the 144th Division is pressing the enemy from the south. Everything is under fire control up to the full encirclement, but there are about 2 km left to the full encirclement. The 144th Division is solving this problem. I believe it will be successful. Then the fate of this group of enemies will be similar to that of the Kupiansk unit. If you remember, the tank group was approximately in the same position, but it was completely destroyed.
Next, the city of Krasnyi Lyman. This is the Krasny Lyman's direction. A rather large settlement. The city has about 11,000 houses. But this is not the point. The point is that it is one of the largest junction sorting railway stations in the former Soviet Union. The most important logistics centers in the DPR. It remains to free 149 houses out of 11,000. Now, I would like to remind you of one more thing. I would like to remind you that the most important fortified area was created by the armed forces of Ukraine for almost 10 years as a strategic defensive line in the agglomeration of the cities of Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka, Oleksiyevo-Druzhkivka, and Kostyantynivka, as well as the slightly southwestern cities of Dobropillya and Ocheretyne. All this is located in the zone of responsibility of the southern and central groups. The third army of the southern group is moving towards Sloviansk at a good pace. Mykolaivka, Sloviansk itself, is about 8 to 9 km away. The offensive is successful in 15 areas. Our troops move in this direction every day. An important event or an important event took place in the zone of responsibility of the central group. Here, our troops broke through a three-level engineering barrier about 400 m deep in four areas and are fighting for possession of the defensive line.
A very important event also took place in the Dobropillya area. In the Dobropillya area, our troops broke through a well-prepared, considered impregnable, three-level engineering barrier, entered the settlement of Annovka, adjacent to Dobropillya, approached the settlement of Dobropillya, and moved north. In the Dobropillya area, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that our troops do not have well-prepared defensive lines in advance. They are now trying to create local strongholds in a hurry. It is 35 km from Dobropillya to the state border. 35 km. We can go back to the battle work of the Southern Group, which is fighting to liberate one of the most important strongholds of the strategic line of defense of the Russian Federation, the city of Konstantinovka. 96% of the city is in our hands. The Fourth Brigade is defending the city. The Sixth Division of the Southern Group has already bypassed Konstantinovka and entered Alekseyevo-Druzhkovka. They entered there, took Pokhachevskogo Street, and is moving on. The neighbors on the left also approached this settlement, Alekseyevo-Druzhkovka. Then there is Druzhkovka itself, a fairly large settlement with 12,000 houses. It is adjacent to Alekseyevo-Druzhkovka. It is only 4 km from Druzhkovka to Kramatorsk, which is considered to be Donetsk's temporary capital by the current Kiev authorities. There are no strongholds there, either. As far as we know, the enemy has begun evacuating industrial enterprises from this agglomeration through mass media.
I would also like to note the special actions of the Vostok group. Despite the increased defense of the enemy, the enemy has moved troops from Donetsk and the Donetsk Republic, well-trained troops, to Zaporizhzhia. Here, our troops, led by Colonel General Andrey Ivanov, are carrying out combat missions to liberate Zaporizhzhia. They are moving on a broad front from 1 km to 300 m every day. The Dnipro group also has a large responsibility zone. It successfully fights in the Orikhiv direction and operates along the coast of the Kakhovka reservoir in the general direction to Zaporizhzhia.
