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ISW: Chechen leader Kadyrov claims readiness to defend Belgorod Oblast against raids

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Chechen Republic Head Ramzan Kadyrov announced that Chechen forces are fully prepared to protect against potential raids in Belgorod Oblast, possibly as a means to keep his troops out of active combat in Ukraine, according to the Institute for the Study of War latest assessment.

Kadyrov, speaking on June 5, announced that he commands a sizeable contingent of 70,000 Chechen servicemen serving in undisclosed formations within the Russian military.

While Kadyrov acknowledged that the Russian "Commander-in-Chief," implicitly referring to President Vladimir Putin, is more knowledgeable in this matter, he wanted to remind everyone of the Chechen units' ability to handle what he called "terrorists" who might infiltrate Belgorod Oblast.

"Kadyrov’s rhetorical shift towards suggesting that Chechen forces get involved in Belgorod Oblast may suggest a desire to preserve his forces from engaging in combat in more challenging sectors of the front," the ISW found.

The ISW previously assessed that Kadyrov seemed to be conserving his forces and has refrained from participating in large-scale offensive operations since the summer of 2022. Furthermore, Kadyrov claimed on May 26 that 7,000 Chechen servicemen were already operating in Ukraine.

"If Kadyrov’s claims are close to accurate, only about 10 percent of available Chechen forces are serving in Ukraine, but his statements are impossible to verify," the ISW concluded.

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Olena Goncharova

Head of North America desk

Olena Goncharova is the Head of North America desk at The Kyiv Independent, where she has previously worked as a development manager and Canadian correspondent. She first joined the Kyiv Post, Ukraine's oldest English-language newspaper, as a staff writer in January 2012 and became the newspaper’s Canadian correspondent in June 2018. She is based in Edmonton, Alberta. Olena has a master’s degree in publishing and editing from the Institute of Journalism in Taras Shevchenko National University in Kyiv. Olena was a 2016 Alfred Friendly Press Partners fellow who worked for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette for six months. The program is administered by the University of Missouri School of Journalism in Columbia.

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