The city of Kherson, held by the Russians for eight months, is about to return to the hands of the Ukrainian army. According to a senior Ukrainian officer, it is only a matter of days.
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The colonel Oleksandr Pyskun welcomes us in wheelchairs, Sunday October 23rd. He lost the use of his legs in the middle of the Donbass war in 2014. He is now a tactical adviser to the Defense Council of the Kryivie Rih Military Administration. It follows minute by minute the advance of Ukrainian troops on Kherson, the largest Ukrainian city under Russian occupation: “Each kilometer is more and more difficult to gain. They have fortified their lines, that is why it is so difficult for our troops to advance. But we keep moving forward. We hope that Kherson will be freed very soon.“The Ukrainian army is gaining ground, even if it still suffers heavy reprisals from the air, with Russian rocket fire throughout its territory.
“I think the morale of the Russians is broken. They are currently evacuating soldiers and collaborators.”
Colonel Oleksandr Pyskunat franceinfo
But the great difficulty for the Ukrainian army is to preserve the civilians who remained in Kherson. “We are not going to take the city by storm because we understand very well that there are still Ukrainian citizens there who could not leave or who did not want to leave their families or their homes, explains Colonel Pyskun. We will take the appropriate measures. But it will be impossible to avoid 100% civilian casualties.The pro-Russian authorities in the Kherson region, annexed by Russia, on Saturday called on all civilians to leave the regional capital “immediately” in the face of advancing forces from kyiv.
Asked about a possible nuclear attack, he does not exclude the hypothesis but it would be “totally illogical” in terms of military strategy. It would simply mean the death of Vladimir Putin.