Pro-Russia Tabloid Confirms 9,800 Russian Soldiers Died In Ukraine, Then Quickly Deletes Report

A pro-government tabloid in Russia published a piece stating that nearly 10,000 Russian troops have been killed in the country's ongoing conflict with Ukraine, but the outlet later removed the figures and claimed it was hacked.

Komsomolskaya Pravda, citing Russia's Ministry of Defense, reported that 9,861 personnel from the country's Armed Forces have died and another 16,153 injured since Russian troops invaded Ukraine, according to Business Insider.

The tabloid, which was labeled by the European Parliament in the past as a pro-Russian-government outlet, later deleted the figures from its report.

Komsomolskaya Pravda then issued a statement addressing the incident and claimed it had been hacked, according to Kevin Rothrock, an editor at the Latvia-based news outlet Meduza.

"On March 21, access to the administrator interface was hacked on the Komsomolskaya Pravda website and a fake stuffing was made in this publication about the situation around the special operation in Ukraine. Inaccurate information was immediately removed," a machine translation of the edited article's postface read.

The original version of the piece can still be accessed in Komsomolskaya Pravda's online archives.

Russia released its first and last official death toll from the war on March 2, stating that Russian fatalities and injuries at that point numbered 498 and 1,597, respectively.

Meanwhile, the latest Russian casualties report released by the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense Monday indicated that Russia suffered around 15,000 combat losses among its personnel since the start of the invasion on Feb. 24.

American intelligence officials estimated earlier that Russia might have lost more than 7,000 troops in its conflict with Ukraine.

Russia’s government blocked access inside the country to the websites of major Russian-language outlets based outside of Russia and Facebook following its military assault on Ukraine.

The Russian government also blocked the website of the BBC, the United Kingdom's national broadcaster, in what officials claimed was "just the beginning of response actions to an information war unleashed by the West."

Before the blocking, the BBC revived shortwave radio dispatches in Ukraine, allowing people in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv and some parts of Russia to tune into the BBC World Service news via radios.