Russia began Wednesday 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 denounced the new strikes the day before on its energy infrastructure.
The Russian occupation authorities in the Kherson region said Wednesday that the evacuation of civilians – they plan to move “50,000 to 60,000” in a few days – had started. “The organized transfer of residents to the other bank of the Dnieper (river) began in Kherson,” the occupation administration of the town of Olechky, east of Kherson, said on Telegram.
The head of this administration, Vladimir Saldo, indicated on the Rossiya 24 television channel that it was evacuating the city in the face of the advance of Ukrainian troops, while assuring that the Russian army would fight on the spot “until the dead “.
According to a pro-Russian official, Evguéni Melnikov, quoted by the Ria-Novosti agency, the evacuees will be able to go to Russia. The Russian channel Rossiya 24 broadcast a report showing people boarding ferries to cross the river.
Russian General Sergei Surovikin, in charge of operations in Ukraine for 10 days, said on Tuesday 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 region of the same name 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, which is causing disruption in the supply of electricity, water and food and represents a “direct threat to the lives of the inhabitants”.
“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.”
Vladimir Saldo clarified that the evacuation to the left bank of the Dnieper of the population of several localities will allow the Russian army to install “large-scale defensive constructions” against a “vast Ukrainian counter-offensive”.
The Russian army, which invaded Ukraine on February 24, is being undermined from 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: on Tuesday it again bombed “the military command and the energy systems of Ukraine”, announced the Russian Ministry of Defense, assuring that “all the targets (had ) been 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 Ukraine “prepare” for possible “electricity, water and heating failures”.
In total, more than a thousand localities remained “private of electricity” Tuesday evening, according to 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 Iran.
Tehran repeated that it had “not exported arms to any of the warring parties”, while Washington threatened to sanction companies or states collaborating in the Iranian drone program.
Russian “Despair”
The new Russian strikes hit many cities in Ukraine on Tuesday, 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”.