As Ukrainians vilify Kherson, Putin turns to Iran

For Kyiv, the West is on track for a “collective victory” over Russia after recapturing Kherson, where the Ukrainian national anthem played on Friday after Russian troops withdrew. Kherson, annexed by Moscow at the end of September, was the first major city to fall since the Russian invasion launched at the end of February.

In pictures broadcast by the armed forces of Q, Ukrainians dance in a circle around a fire to the rhythm of a patriotic song “Chervona Galina”. In the village of Pravdin, outside Kherson, returning residents hug their neighbors. Some could not hold back the tears.

“Victory at last! Says Svitlana Galak. “Thank God, we are finally free and now everything will find its place”, continues this 43-year-old woman who lost her eldest son in the war. “We are Ukraine,” says her husband, 44-year-old Vigor.

“We are all overjoyed,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Saturday, as he announced significant destruction in the region. “Before fleeing Kherson, the occupiers destroyed all essential infrastructure – communications, water supply, heating, electricity,” he added, adding that 2,000 explosive devices were defused.

According to him, the Ukrainian Armed Forces have regained control of almost 60 places in the Kherson region. After eight months of occupation by Russian forces, national television shows are back in Kherson. And the region’s energy provider said it was working to restore power supply.

About 200 police have been deployed in Kherson to set up roadblocks and document “crimes of the Russian occupiers,” national police chief Igor Klymenko said in a statement. He warned residents of the city about the presence of explosives left behind by Russian forces, urging them to “move with caution.” Mr. According to Klymenko, a policeman was injured during a demining operation in a building in Kherson.

A woman and two children were injured in an explosion near their car in the village of Mylov, Kherson region, according to police who reported Russian shelling in the Berislav district.

3rd setback in a year

The Russian withdrawal is the third since the start of the invasion on February 24, when Russia had to surrender in the spring before being driven out of nearly all the country in the face of fierce resistance from the Ukrainians. Kharkiv Region (Northeast) in September.

On Friday, the Russian Defense Ministry announced that it had completed a “redistribution” of its units from the right (west) bank of the Dnieper, where Kherson is located, to the left bank, claiming no casualties. Abandoned military equipment. According to Moscow, “more than 30,000” Russian soldiers and “nearly 5,000 units of weapons and military vehicles have been withdrawn” from the west bank of the Dnieper.

However, this decline has all but one snub, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced at the end of September that he would annex four Ukrainian regions, including Kherson.

On Saturday, President Putin spoke with his Iranian counterpart, Ibrahim Raisi, at a time when Tehran appears to be a key ally of Moscow in its intervention in Ukraine. The Kremlin said the two leaders “placed emphasis on intensifying cooperation in the political, economic and trade spheres”.