Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the U.N. was turning a blind eye to excesses committed by Ukrainian forces in their incursion into Russia's Kursk region, launched last month.

Regardless of whether the Russian army eventually succeeds in driving the Ukrainians back across the border, the meticulously planned and executed Kursk offensive has dramatically changed how the war is being perceived in both the Western world and in Russia.

Russia refuses to help its residents who remain in the Kursk region. Because of this, they are turning to the Ukrainian Defense Forces for help, according to a spokesperson for the commandant's office of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in Sudzha,