“Thank you to the soldiers of the 60th Separate Infantry Brigade, whose units are showing good results in the Kherson region”, rejoiced Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday evening, announcing the capture of more than 30 armored vehicles, a thousand projectiles for tanks and three pieces of artillery.
A little earlier, an adviser to the Ukrainian presidency, Kyrylo Tymoshenko had indicated that 88 localities had been taken over in the region of Kherson annexed by Russia. A previous assessment, on October 13, reported 75 towns and villages reconquered by Ukraine.
“The city of Kherson, like a fortress, is preparing its defence,” said deputy official in charge of the Russian occupation in Kherson, Kirill Stremoussov. The authorities mandated by the Kremlin announced on their side the death of four people, including two journalists, during a night bombardment on a bridge in Kherson.
Evacuations that look like deportation
The Ukrainian army denied having targeted civilians: “We are not touching essential infrastructure, we are not touching peaceful localities and the local population,” said a spokeswoman, Natalia Goumenyuk. Pro-Russian forces have urged civilians to move to the left bank of the Dnieper in the face of the Ukrainian counter-offensive in this region recently annexed by Moscow.
Kherson is the first major city to be taken by Russian forces at the start of their offensive. The pro-Russian administration plans to evacuate “50,000 to 60,000” people in a few days. The secretary of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council, Oleksiï Danilov, on Wednesday castigated “the preparation of the mass deportation of the Ukrainian population” to Russia, according to him in order to modify the ethnic composition of the occupied territories.
VIDEO. In Kherson, the Russians evacuate civilians “to save above all… their troops”
For General Dominique Trinquand, former head of the French military mission to the UN, the evacuation of Kherson looks more like the first phase of a change in Russian strategy in the region. “The Russians know now that they are going to lose Kherson. We will see what will happen in the coming days, but it is possible that these evacuations of civilians actually mask a withdrawal of Russian troops – 15,000 men – posted on the right bank of the Dnieper (river which borders the city of Kherson) “.
Ukraine also called on Friday for an international observation mission to the Kakhovka dam in the Kherson region, where it accuses Russia of “consciously preparing the ground for a large-scale disaster”.
VIDEO. Zelensky accuses Russia of mining a dam in southern Ukraine
On Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russian forces of having “undermined the dam and units of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station”, one of the largest infrastructures of its kind in Ukraine. The Russian occupation authorities in Kherson have denied any mining of the dam.