Heavy Ukraine War casualties are proportionately impacting Russian ethnic minorities and Eastern periphery populations more than those in the federation's riches cities, the United Kingdom Defense Ministry assessed in a Sunday morning intelligence update.
"In many of the Eastern regions, deaths are likely running, as a percentage of the population, at a rate 30+ times higher than in Moscow," said the Defense Ministry. "In places, ethnic minorities take the biggest hit; in Astrakhan some 75% of casualties come from the minority Kazakh and Tartar populations."
The UK said cities like Moscow and St. Petersburg had proportionately lost little of their population in the invasion.
"This is especially true for the families of the country’s elite," said the ministry. "As the Russian MoD seeks to address its continued deficit of combat personnel, insulating the better-off and more influential elements of Russian society will highly likely remain a major consideration."