No fewer than 30,000 Ukrainian soldiers have died since Russia’s February 2022 invasion, a Ukrainian civic group reveals.
Kyiv considers its losses a state secret, and officials fear releasing the figure would jeopardize the country’s war effort.
The New York Times reported in August, citing anonymous US officials, that the Ukrainian death toll was close to 70,000.
In the Ukrainian journal Tyzhden, historian Yaroslav Tynchenko and volunteer Herman Shapovalenko claimed that utilizing open sources, Shapovalenko’s Book of Memory project had confirmed 24,500 combat and non-war deaths.
According to reports, the real figure of dead soldiers was likely higher, they added, noting that many of the 15,000 troops listed as missing were likely dead.
“Obviously, the 24,500 names are not the final number of dead (deceased), but by our assessment, it is no less than 70%,” the authors wrote. “That is, the real number of dead (deceased) in combat and non-combat situations is more than 30,000 people.”
Using a 1:3 ratio, the authors estimated that up to 100,000 soldiers were injured.
When contacted, a spokesman for Ukraine’s defence ministry said he couldn’t comment on the data.
The Book of Memory initiative, which has been tracking Ukraine’s war dead since Russia’s initial incursion in 2014, did not respond to a request for comment right away.
Tynchenko declined to comment on the article in a message sent through his employer, the National Military History Museum of Ukraine.
The article, which was published late Tuesday, comes as Ukraine faces the threat of a long war with Russia.
Ukraine’s senior commander recently stated in the Economist that the fight was becoming static and attritional. A counteroffensive initiated by Ukraine in June has made only minor gains in the south and east.
The writers of the Tyzhden paper stressed the importance of balancing various estimations provided in Western media, which they described as “manipulative,” with reliable data.
“Should we talk about this topic in Ukraine during the war? We believe so, but only in terms of concrete data and open and trustworthy sources,” they wrote.
Russia has also not disclosed the number of its soldiers who have died in the war.
