“For the first time, the Kursk region was hit by Western-made rocket launchers, probably American Himars,” Maria Zakharova, spokesman for the Russian foreign ministry, said late yesterday on the Telegram messaging app.

“As a result of the attack on the bridge over the Seym River in the Glushkovo district, it was completely destroyed, and volunteers who were assisting the evacuated civilian population were killed.”

Ukrainian army chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said on Friday that Kyiv’s forces were advancing between one and 3km in some areas in the Kursk region, 11 days since beginning an incursion into Russia.

Kyiv has claimed to have taken control of 82 settlements over an area of 1,150sq km in the region since Aug 6.

Reuters could not independently verify either side’s battlefield accounts.

Russia has accused the West of supporting and encouraging Ukraine’s first ground offensive on Russian territory and said Kyiv’s “terrorist invasion” would not change the course of the war.

The US, which has said it cannot allow Russian president Vladimir Putin to win the war he launched in February 2022, so far deems the surprise incursion a protective move that justifies the use of US weaponry, officials in Washington said.