Retreating enemy turning Kherson into ‘city of death’, Ukrainians fear
Kyiv warns Moscow’s forces mined ‘everything they can’ in withdrawal across Dnipro river
Russian forces in southern Ukraine were last night on the brink of collapse as Ukraine cautiously gained ground, edging closer to the port city of Kherson.
A day after Moscow’s defence minister ordered its troops to retreat from the regional capital, the fighting reached within 10 miles of city limits.
Russian soldiers were abandoning wounded comrades as they made a hasty retreat, sources on the front line told The Daily Telegraph.
Kyiv announced the liberation of more than a dozen surrounding towns, reclaiming some 60 square miles, en route to Kherson. But Ukrainian officials warned Moscow’s planned withdrawal from the west bank of the Dnipro could be a plot to lure their forces into a bloody urban battle.
Mykhailo Podolyak, a top aide to the Ukrainian president, said Russian forces had mined “everything they can” in an attempt to turn Kherson into a “city of death”, as well as blowing up bridges to slow Ukraine’s advance.
“RF [Russia] wants to turn Kherson into a ‘city of death’. The Russian military mines everything they can: apartments, sewers. Artillery on the left bank plans to turn the city into ruins,” he wrote on Twitter.
“This is what [the] ‘Russian world’ looks like: came, robbed, celebrated, killed ‘witnesses’, left ruins and left,” he added.
Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, Ukraine’s commander-in-chief, said yesterday his forces had captured 12 settlements from the Russians, in a two-pronged advance on the southern front.
Ukrainian soldiers shared a video online from Snihurivka, 30 miles north-west of Kherson, saying the village had been liberated by members of the 131st reconnaissance battalion.
The footage showed them in front of their armoured vehicle, one soldier standing on the gun turret holding their country’s flag aloft.
As the day went on, videos emerged of Ukrainian troops appearing to enter towns and villages formerly held by Moscow, including Kysylivka, just eight miles from Kherson.
Nikolai, a Ukrainian soldier fighting in the region, told The Telegraph: “There is a withdrawal of Russian troops to more fortified positions. But there were still populated points where we saw battles. They withdraw because they suffer losses, very heavy losses. What’s more, they don’t even take the bodies of their soldiers and leave the wounded behind.
“We are constantly attacking. And they have no choice but to retreat beyond the Dnipro river, where they have concentrated all their strength.”
A Ukrainian defence official said Kyiv’s forces would continue to attack Russian troops and hardware, as Moscow did not request a “green corridor” for its withdrawal.
Inside the city, witnesses described an eerie atmosphere around Kherson.
The doors of the city’s central police station were left flung wide open without a single Russian to be seen.
Military checkpoints were left abandoned while only a handful of Russian troops made their way into the centre to buy some final supplies from a local market. What was believed to be some of the final remaining military trucks were spotted retreating towards the river.
“In the city, there were no checkpoints at all, there were no Russians… no soldiers,” said one resident. They said the air was filled with the whirring sound of generators and outgoing artillery fire as the Russians attempted to stall the Ukrainian advance.
There were large-scale blackouts, with no electricity or water supplies running into the city. Local media reports claimed Russian troops had blown up a TV broadcast tower, as well as an electrical facility in the city.
Only gas remained connected, supplied from a Russian feed, which they feared could be cut off as soon as Moscow’s forces left Kherson.
The loss of Kherson, where billboards claimed “Russia is here forever”, would be a significant defeat for Vladimir Putin. The wider area is one of four Ukrainian territories that he annexed in September.
At the time, Mr Putin signalled he would defend the regions, which also include Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk and Luhansk, with nuclear weapons.
While the Kremlin has backtracked on those remarks, Kherson’s residents fear they could be caught up in a brutal artillery battle between Russian and Ukrainian forces.
Many have already attempted to make their escape to Crimea, the peninsula illegally annexed by Moscow in 2014, to seek shelter.
“People are trying to leave for Crimea because they are scared of what could happen,” one resident said.
“Kherson will be hard for the Russians to lose, we’re now expecting something bad to happen.”
They predicted reprisal attacks on either the hydroelectric dam in Nova Kakhovka or a strike on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.
The Russian retreat is expected to take a number of days to complete, with between 20,000 to 30,000 troops needed to be withdrawn to the opposite bank of the Dnipro.
Gen Mark Milley, America’s top military commander, said: “This is going to take them days and perhaps even weeks to pull those forces south of that river.”
The comment sections of some of Russia’s most popular pro-war Telegram channels were flooded with indignant comments, accusing the Russian leadership of betraying the country.