A group of Russian insurgents known as the Freedom of Russia Legion, who are aligned with the Ukrainian Armed Forces, crossed the border with Russia's Belgorod Oblast on the 22th of May 2023. The Freedom of Russia Legion, a unit that consists only of Russian volunteers, subsequently announced that it and the Russian Volunteer Corps (a different group reportedly responsible for an incursion into the Bryansk region in March) had secured the village of Kozinka in the Belgorod region, and that its forward detachments had entered the town of Grayvoron.