Russian Chief of Staff Valery Gerasimov visited the frontline in the Donbass region, Moscow’s priority objective in eastern Ukraine, last week, a senior Russian official said on Monday. Pentagon. “What we can confirm is that we know that for several days last week he was in Donbass,” the official said. “We don’t think he’s still there. We think he left and is back in Russia. We cannot confirm reports that he was injured,” he added. An adviser to Ukrainian Interior Minister Anton Guerashchenko said on Sunday that many Russian officers had been hit in an “explosion” in Izium, eastern Ukraine, adding that Valery Guerassimov was on the spot. Another adviser to the Interior Ministry, Viktor Androussiv, for his part, affirmed on Ukrainian television that Guerassimov had not been injured. “We have confirmation that he was there, in the region of Izioum (…). We have certain confirmations that he was not injured,” he said. Valery Gerasimov is said to have inspected the front to better understand the conditions on the ground, as Russian forces, after failing to take kyiv, are trying to take control of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. The Pentagon official also said Russian forces were making limited progress in their battle against the Ukrainians in the region. According to him, the Russians, for example, took control of villages and then lost them to Ukrainian fighters. He claimed that the Russian military was demoralized and suffered from a disorganized command.