Russia begins to evacuate civilians from the city of Kherson in the face of a possible Ukrainian offensive

Kherson, the only provincial capital in Ukraine that Russia keeps under control, is preparing for the imminent offensive of kyiv for its reconquest.

The new head of all Russian armed forces in Ukraine, Sergei Surovikin, has paved the way with an interview in which he admits that "difficult decisions" will have to be made on this front.

The military authorities imposed by Moscow in the annexed province of Kherson have begun to remove the inhabitants from there this Wednesday.

Also, in order not to hinder the movement of its troops, no civilian will be allowed to enter the region for at least seven days.

The Ukrainian government has accused Moscow on Wednesday of mounting a "propaganda show" with the evacuation and of trying to scare citizens.

The city has woken up with long queues of people in front of the buses that were going to take them to the other side of the Dnieper River, also Ukrainian territory occupied by Russia.

The governor of the Kremlin in that territory, Vladimir Saldo, affirms that more than 5,000 people have left that province in the last two days, although the official evacuation begins today in a region where, according to his calculations, more than 40% of the residents have gone into exile due to the war unleashed by Moscow in February – around 500,000 people would remain in the entire region.

Most of the displaced people left in the first months of the invasion to areas of free Ukraine and the European Union.

After closing the access passages between the territories occupied by the Russian army to those controlled by kyiv,

thousands of people chose to leave the area through Russia, and from there, to the Baltic countries.

That option is much more difficult since those EU states closed their doors to the Russians.

The Ukrainian counteroffensive on Kherson province began in late August.

Their progress has been slower than the surprise attack in September that drove the Russians out of northeastern Kharkov in a few weeks.

On the other hand, the Lugansk and Donetsk fronts remain stable, in Moscow's orbit since the insurrection promoted in 2014. The Ukrainian Armed Forces are trying to take the province by surrounding the invading troops: on the one hand, they are advancing on the northwestern flank, from the Dnipro province;

on the other, the offensive is taking place from the south, from the city of Mikolaiv.

The operation from the northern front is more complex because it requires crossing the Dnieper River, the largest in the country.

From Mikolaiv, on the other hand, the advance is through flat and direct territory.

The province is essential for the survival of the Ukrainian state, because it gives it access to the northernmost shore of the Black Sea, and because it would drive the Russians from the western bank of the Dnieper River in the city of Kherson.

In addition, taking the province would allow the defending forces to isolate Crimea, illegally annexed by Russia in 2014, and open a new front to the south over Zaporizhia and the Sea of ​​Azov.

Exit Calls

Russian authorities insist they are carrying out a voluntary evacuation.

“Dear residents!

Evacuate soon.

Ukrainian forces will bombard residential buildings.

The buses will leave from 7.00 from Rechport to the East Bank, ”said a message that its inhabitants have received.

The

newspaper , declared a foreign agent by the Kremlin, has shown several of the evacuation pamphlets distributed in the city.

"Protect your family, go to the left bank," one headline accompanied by a photo of some parents and his son with the smile of a dental clinic ad and wrapped in the Russian flag.

The left bank is, in fact, the eastern one, the one south of the city, since it is not named from the point of view of the map, but on its course to the mouth of the Dnieper.

“What do you need to know about leaving?”, headlines another pamphlet where it is emphasized that the civil-military authorities imposed in the annexed region offer “the possibility for the families of Kherson to go to other regions of Russia to rest and study ”.

In it, an archive drawing of another happy family with binoculars and even a mask from a pandemic that was long forgotten.

“If the fighting starts, there will be artillery shells and they will bombard the city.

It is better to get people out of the city, and that is what we are doing now," Russian Governor Vladimir Saldo said in an interview with Rossiya 24 channel. "In order for this task to be more orderly, the entry of civilians into the Kherson region will be banned for seven days,” he added.

In addition to the existing ferries, the authorities have sent new boats to the city's river port to cross the Dnieper River.

General Surovikin, also head of the Russian Aerospace Forces, said Tuesday that the Ukrainian army could attack the city with "prohibited weapons" or destroy the Nova Kajovka hydroelectric plant.

The regional governor has qualified the danger that a hypothetical flood could pose.

"The water level would not rise more than a meter or meter and a half," Saldo stressed in the case of the dam's rupture.

"No one plans to hand over Kherson to the Ukrainian armed forces," stressed the Kremlin-imposed boss in the area.

In addition, he has pointed out that the march of the civilians will facilitate the fortification of the city.

Assault on Zaporizhia

A Russian representative in the province of Zaporizhia, Vladimir Rogov, has assured the Russian agency Ria Novosti that last night, a mission of 30 Ukrainian boats had tried to cross the Dnieper to assault Energodar, a municipality occupied by Russia and where the Europe's largest nuclear power plant.

Before the war, the Zaporizhia plant provided 20% of Ukraine's electricity.

Russian sources also claim that an Energodar electrical substation was destroyed on Tuesday by long-range Ukrainian artillery.

Surovikin's appointment has been received like rain in May by the pro-Russian channels in the face of the debacle of the last two months.

“Why were we so excited about creating a unified command?

The left flank did not know how the right flank fought, now we are reaping the fruits of that disorder," Alexander Sladkov, war correspondent for the

before showing his optimism: "If we do the right thing, I think we will stand firm." .

At the gates of Crimea

If Ukraine recaptures Kherson, it would open a new chapter in the war because it would be at the gates of Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014. The Ukrainian Armed Forces are putting all the meat on the grill to take the city of Nova Kajovka, to the north from the city of Kherson, because it is home to one of the largest dams on the Dnieper River and from where Russia channels water and electricity to Crimea.

Moscow safely supplies weapons and equipment to its Army in southern Ukraine from Crimea — away from Ukrainian long-range artillery.

The Center for Defense Strategies (CDS), a Ukrainian institute for security policy analysis,

He assures that the Russian troops in Kherson are suffering a reduction in the supply of material due to the sabotage that occurred on October 8 against the Kerch Strait bridge, the only infrastructure that connects Crimea with Russia.

The passage of trains and vehicles has been affected and occurs with less intensity than in previous months.

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