Russian troops abandon city of Kherson in humiliation for Putin

RUSSIAN troops were ordered to withdraw from the city of Kherson yesterday in one of the most embarrassing setbacks the Kremlin has suffered since the invasion began.

“Begin to pull out troops,” Gen Sergei Shoigu, the Russian defence minister, told Sergei Surovikin, the commander in Ukraine, in a carefully choreographed televised meeting.

Gen Surovikin said he proposed the “difficult decision” to withdraw from Kherson – the only regional capital Moscow managed to capture – and set up defences on the eastern bank of the Dnipro River.

The widely expected withdrawal is among the most symbolic defeats Russia has suffered in the eight-month war. In a bid to play down its significance, Gen Surovikin presented the retreat as a tactical necessity.

“I realise that’s not an easy decision but, more importantly, we will save the lives of our troops and preserve our combat readiness,” he said.

Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, warned against underestimating the Russian army despite the retreat as he announced that Britain had now sent about 1,000 surface to air missiles to protect Ukrainian infrastructure.

He said: “Fundamentally, they’ve lost the only thing they did capture. It means it’s Russia nil and Ukraine one so far. But history says do not underestimate the Russian army, or the Russians.”

Jens Stoltenberg, the Nato Secretary General, who was in London to meet Rishi Sunak, said Ukraine partly owed its success in Kherson to support from Britain and other Western allies.

The loss of Kherson is embarrassing for Vladimir Putin, who less than two months ago signed an annexation treaty declaring the region and its capital city part of the Russian Federation.

The Russian president toured a Moscow hospital yesterday and did not comment on the retreat. Yevgeny Prigozhin, the hawkish businessman behind the mercenary group Wagner, lauded Gen Surovikin for taking the decision to avoid major losses.

“This is definitely not a step towards a victory in this war but we shouldn’t agonise over it or panic,” he said.

Reports of Russian troops preparing to leave Kherson have been swirling for days, but the Ukrainian government has played them down, suspecting that Russia was laying a trap.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser for

President Volodymyr Zelensky, said his country could see no sign of Russia leaving Kherson “without a fight”.

A Kherson resident speaking to The Daily Telegraph described an atmosphere of anticipation and confusion hanging over the city. “I’m keeping my fingers crossed,” they said. “Nothing has changed in the city and there is no fighting. Many Russian soldiers walk around the city in civilian clothes.”

One of Moscow’s most prominent officials in Kherson, Kirill Stremousov, who only yesterday morning insisted Russia was not abandoning the city, was reportedly killed in a car crash hours before the announcement.

It was not immediately clear if he was targeted by Ukrainian partisans, who have assassinated several figures in the occupation administration since the city fell to the Russians in March.

Ukraine’s forces have for weeks been capturing villages en route to the city near the Black Sea. A Ukrainian victory in the region could sever the land bridge that the Kremlin established from Russia to Crimea and restore Ukraine’s access to the Sea of Azov.

Though they have suffered setbacks in Kherson, Russian forces have continued to put up strong resistance in other parts of Ukraine.