As for today, about 32,000 Russians fight within the ranks of the militants in Donbas. Viktor Muzhenko, the Head of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine claimed this as BBC Ukraine reported.
"We talk about the fact that there are the Russian regular armies reformed at the end of 2014 and in 2015 in the first and second army corps. The total number of these armies is about 32,000 people. Also, there are more than 700 tanks, cannons, artillery systems. Moreover, there are the mercenaries and the soldiers of the regular Armed Forces of Russia," Muzhenko noted.
He added that during the last time the increase in the number of the militants' material stock is observed.
"The columns from Russia enters, they bring the material means, including the ammunition. It is interesting that it is not a grouping of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic and Luhansk People's Republic, it is the regular detachments that obey to the staff of the eights general military based in Novocherkask," he added.
Earlier Muzhenko claimed that the funding in the sum of at least $4 billion is needed for the army in 2019. He added that now the outflow of the personnel is observed, also, because of the material problems and it can have serious consequences for the combat readiness of the Armed Forces.
Also, he told how Ukraine is going to spend $250 million the U.S. allocated for medicine, air defence and electronic countermeasures.
