Retreat or die, Russians warned

KYIV: A senior Ukrainian official has told Russian troops to “retreat, surrender or be destroyed” as Kyiv launched a campaign to retake a key southern region.

Oleksiy Arestovych, an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky, said the campaign to recapture the Kherson region “has begun” and Ukraine was aiming to cut off Russia’s invading forces from their supply lines.

The British defence ministry said Ukraine had used Westernsupplied longrange missiles to damage at least three bridges over the Dnipro River that Russia uses to resupply its forces. It said thousands of Russian troops were “highly vulnerable”.

Ukraine is believed to have used US Himars missiles to hit the 1000m Antonivskyi Bridge. It is likely to be “unusable”, Britain’s defence ministry said.

Mr Arestovych vowed that Ukraine would destroy Russian “ammunition depots, fuel, communications and command” before “mopping up the remnants of their forces”.

Mr Zelensky (pictured) said: “We are doing everything to ensure that the occupying forces do not have any logistical opportunities in our country.”

Kherson was one of the first Ukrainian cities to fall to Russia’s forces after the Kremlin launched its invasion on February 24.

Officials installed by Moscow in the region have said they planned to hold a “referendum” this autumn on incorporating the region into Russia. The Kremlin used the same tactic when it annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014.

Mykhailo Podolyak, another Ukrainian presidential adviser, said Russian troops should “learn how to swim across” the river or leave Kherson “while it is still possible”.

The push to reclaim the Kherson region came as five people were killed and more than 20 injured when Russian missiles hit hangars at a flight school in the central Ukrainian city of Kropyvnytskyi.

Fifteen people were injured as missiles struck the Vyshhorod district near Kyiv.