Ukraine-Russia news: Sick Vladimir Putin ‘using convicts as CANNON FODDER’ as army suffers ‘incredibly high’ deaths

VLADIMIR Putin is recruiting lags from Russian jails to fight as his army suffers “incredibly high” fatalities & casualties on the frontline.

Last month, it was reported how Russia has lost nearly a third of its army’s strength since , according to the UK’s Chief of the Defence Staff.

Admiral Sir Tony Radakin said detailed assessments show President Vladimir Putin’s plan has spectacularly failed.

But western officials believe the madman president is using convicts as cannon fodder and paying for private military companies because of a fear of political opposition in Russia if he attempts to draw on the wider population.

The assembly of what appears to be a third Russian army corps of 10-15,000 personnel has been detected by the West, but there is not yet definitive proof of whether it is destined for .

Russia’s offensive has slowed as a result of casualties thought to run to as many 75,000 Russian troops, of whom up to 20,000 are thought to have been killed and the rest taken out of the fight by injury.

“Russia has changed the way it’s fighting to adapt to the reduction of personnel – and skilled personnel,” said one official.

“We do think that they have recruited from prisons and they are obviously also working with private military companies to increase their resourcing levels,” said one Western official.

“Particular elements of the Russian forces have suffered significant losses, and the fatalities and the wounded are obviously incredibly high and I don’t think something the Russians anticipated at all.”

Putin’s military is now so weakened, Ukrainian nationals are increasingly confident they will soon reclaim all their old borders.

Finland and Norway have also wrecked Putin’s bid to divide and weaken the western alliance by applying to join Nato.

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