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Russian pro-war channels have published drone footage from the center of Sudzha showing Russian soldiers raising flags on Sovetskaya Square near the city administration. The town is located in Russia’s Kursk Region and had been under the control of Ukrainian forces since August 2024.
One of the first outlets to share images of Russian troops was the Telegram channel Arkhangel Spetsnaza (lit. “Archangel of the Special Forces”). The photos show seven individuals holding the Russian flag, the flag of the Russian Empire, as well as the flags of the Russian Airborne Forces (VDV) and the Wagner Group.
The authors of the Telegram channel noted that “clean-up operations” in the city continue. “The enemy is still resisting, the flags were placed as a marker,” they added. According to Arkhangel Spetsnaza, the Russian advance involved members of the 11th Guards Airborne Brigade. This was confirmed by war correspondent Yevgeny Poddubny of Russia’s state-run television channel VGTRK. Poddubny added that in addition to airborne troops, the footage also showed soldiers from the 2nd Separate Guards Special Purpose Brigade.
Poddubny shared a video of the soldiers raising the Russian flag and the VDV flag on the square.
An analysis by The Insider confirmed that both the photos and videos were taken on Sovetskaya Square in Sudzha. A building with a red roof seen in the footage is the Sudzha Central House of Culture, while the city administration can be seen across the road from the square. A damaged pedestal visible in the video appears to be the remnants of a local monument to Vladimir Lenin.
On March 11, Russia’s leading propaganda broadcaster, Channel One, aired a report from Sudzha (available below). According to the independent investigative publication Important Stories, the footage it used was filmed on the eastern outskirts of the city, near the settlement of Mirny. Also on March 11, the Telegram channel Pepel Kursk posted a video from Sudzha, allegedly recorded by Russian soldiers. This video was also shot near Mirny, about three kilometers from the city center.
Following the publication of the footage from Sovetskaya Square, military analyst Yan Matveev suggested on his Telegram channel that the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) had “likely completely abandoned the city.” He added that, “This means they will fully withdraw from the Kursk Region by the end of the day.”
Defense expert Ruslan Leviev, founder of the military think tank Conflict Intelligence Team (CIT), told independent Netherlands-based Russian-language broadcaster Dozhd that Sudzha has likely almost entirely come under Russian control:
“Yesterday, video footage confirmed the presence of Russian forces on the eastern outskirts of the city. Today, we see Russian troops on the opposite edge. And once again, there is no footage of active combat... In reality, we can already say that the entire city of Sudzha has fallen under Russian control… This story may conclude today, or perhaps it will take another two or three days for the border villages to be fully secured.”