15,000 Russians killed in Ukraine war, says CIA director 

CIA Director William Burns said on Wednesday that there have been at least 15,000 Russian casualties and more than 45,000 wounded so far in the Ukraine war. 

"The latest estimates from the U.S. intelligence community would be something in the vicinity of 15,000 (Russian forces) killed and maybe three times that wounded. So a quite significant set of losses," Burns said, speaking at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado.

"And, the Ukrainians have suffered as well - probably a little less than that. But, you know, significant casualties."

Russia has not released an official figure for the casualties it has suffered during the war because the Kremlin classifies military deaths as state secrets. However, on March 25, Russia said 1,351 of its soldiers had been killed. 

Burns added that Russian forces are now concentrated in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine and are occupying about a fifth of the country. Russia changed its approach after learning from failures at the start of the campaign, where its troops were stalled and failed to secure Kyiv, he continued.

"Russia continues to make minimal gains in its Donbas offensive, with Ukrainian forces holding the line," according to a U.K. Ministry of Defense intelligence report published on Wednesday.

The illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine is continuing.

The map below is the latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine - 20 July 2022

Find out more about the UK government's response: https://t.co/TDyX3xP8dj

🇺🇦 #StandWithUkraine 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/iJQABeip3i

— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) July 20, 2022

"In a way, what the Russian military has done is retreat to a more comfortable way of war, in a sense, by using their advantages and long-range firepower to stand off and effectively destroy Ukrainian targets and to compensate for the weaknesses in manpower that they still experience," Burns said.

Burns also addressed Kyiv’s recent internal purge of government officials during the war, a move Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is carrying out citing their failure to root out Russian spies and address treason. 

Ukraine has been able to conduct the purge with help from the United States, which is providing Zelensky with intelligence and is helping guide its battlefield decisions. 

"We're confident that the partnerships we built are effective ones," Burns said.

"And we're sharing quite significant amounts of intelligence with the Ukrainian services and with the Ukrainian leadership that they're putting to a very effective use."