War in Ukraine, day 236 | The Russian army prepares to evacuate the population of Kherson

(Kyiv) Russia is preparing to evacuate the population of Kherson, a city in southern Ukraine where its troops are facing a particularly “tense” situation in the face of the counter-offensive by Kyiv, which has denounced the numerous strikes having targeted again on Tuesday its energy infrastructure.

Russian General Sergei Surovikin, in charge of operations in Ukraine for ten days, said on the Rossiya 24 channel that the Russian army was going to “first and foremost ensure the safe evacuation of the population” from Kherson, without further indication.

Capital of the eponymous region occupied by Russia since the spring and annexed in September, this city is currently targeted by Ukrainian strikes on its “social, economic and industrial infrastructure”, he noted.

This leads, according to him, to disruptions in the supply of electricity, water and food, therefore representing a “direct threat to the lives of the inhabitants” and therefore the need to evacuate it.

“Further actions regarding the city of Kherson itself will depend on the military situation,” he continued, adding without further clarification “not to rule out a very difficult decision-making.”

For his part, the leader installed in the Kherson region by Moscow, Vladimir Saldo, announced an evacuation to the left bank of the Dnieper river of the population of several localities to allow the Russian army to install “defensive constructions of scale” in the face of a “vast counter-offensive” prepared by the Ukrainian forces.

The Russian army, which invaded Ukraine on February 24, is being harmed on all sides.

While “very difficult” in Kherson, “the situation in the special military operation zone can be described as tense. The enemy does not give up its attempts to attack the positions of Russian troops,” the general said. “The Ukrainian regime is trying to break through our defence” by gathering “all its reserves” for the counter-offensive in the south and east.

Russia has not lost its bite, however, since it again bombed “the military command and energy systems of Ukraine” on Tuesday, announced the Russian Ministry of Defense, assuring that “all targets [avaient] hit” with unidentified precision and long-range weapons.

Critical situation ”

According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, “since October 10, 30% of Ukrainian power plants have been destroyed, causing massive blackouts across the country” as winter approaches.

“The situation is now critical”, added a presidential adviser, asking that all of Ukraine “prepare” for possible “electricity, water and heating blackouts”.

In total, “1162 localities remain without electricity” and more than 70 people were killed and 290 injured, counted the Ukrainian emergency service.

Strikes by suicide drones had already caused power cuts in three regions on Monday, killing at least nine people.

On October 10, Russian bombardments on a scale unmatched for months, also on energy infrastructure, left at least 19 dead and 105 injured.

Kyiv’s Western allies then promised more air defense systems, some of which have already been delivered.

Moscow’s use of Iranian drones, according to Kyiv, was also substantiated on Tuesday: the Russian army sent in “the last 24 hours” 43 “Iranian-made Shahed-136” drones, of which “38 were shot down by Ukrainian soldiers,” said the General Staff of the Ukrainian forces.

This “call for help” to Iran is “the Kremlin’s recognition of its military and political bankruptcy”, mocked Mr. Zelensky in the evening, who reiterated his refusal to negotiate with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.

“We have no such information,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov replied when asked by a journalist about Moscow’s use of Iranian drones in Ukraine. “Russian technology is used, with Russian names.”

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kouleba on Tuesday proposed to Mr. Zelensky to break diplomatic relations with Tehran.

Still, Tehran has repeated that it has “exported arms to none of the warring parties”, while Washington has threatened to sanction companies or states collaborating in the Iranian drone program.

All-out bombings

The new Russian strikes hit many cities in Ukraine, both the capital Kyiv and Mykolaiv (south), Dnipro (center-east), Kharkiv (north-east) or Zhytomyr (west of Kyiv). They killed at least three people.

The Russians “attack critical infrastructure […] which people need in their daily lives and which are not military targets”, denounced the head of American diplomacy Antony Blinken, considering that it was “a sign of despair on the part of Russia”.

The Russian army is on the defensive on most of the front in Ukraine, retreating since September in the north as well as in the east and south. The only section where it is still advancing is near the city of Bakhmout (east), which it has been trying to take since the summer.

The partial mobilization of hundreds of thousands of Russian reservists, decided by Vladimir Putin after his heavy losses, is not “for the moment” completed, the Kremlin said.

Kyiv also denounced the “inaction” of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to help its prisoner soldiers whom the organization has not yet been able to visit. And to denounce the fact that its “prisoners of war and civilian hostages are daily tortured by hunger, by electrocutions”.

And the Ukrainian operator Energoatom accused Russia on Tuesday of having “kidnapped” two executives from the Zaporijjia nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe, which it has occupied since March in southern Ukraine.