Scenes of Chaos in Russian Forces – Many Russian Soldiers Failed to Escape, Others Thrown in Their Uniforms – Others Drowned
As a disorderly retreat a local Ukrainian official presents the “withdrawal” of Russian forces from Kherson.
Russia may have announced today the completion of its troop withdrawal from the strategic southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, with a local official saying Ukrainians raised a flag there, but many Russian soldiers were unable to escape.
Reuters was not immediately able to confirm the depth of the Ukrainian advance, the stage of the Russian retreat or the fate of which Russian soldiers may have been left behind as Moscow hastened to withdraw its troops across the Dnieper.
Serhi Khlan, a member of the Kherson Regional Council, said many Russian soldiers had drowned trying to escape from Kherson, while others had changed their military uniforms into civilian clothes and were trying to hide. The city was almost entirely under the control of Ukrainian forces, he said. He advised residents to stay indoors while searches are carried out to locate Russian soldiers who may have stayed behind.
If there are indeed Russian soldiers still on the west bank of the Dnieper, Moscow will have to figure out how to get them to safety by wading across the river while under fire from the advancing Ukrainians.
Moscow presents a different picture
Earlier, the Russian Defense Ministry painted a different picture of a tactical withdrawal, saying it had completed the withdrawal of its troops from the western bank of the Dnieper, where Kherson is located, just two days after Moscow announced the withdrawal.
According to the ministry there is no trace of military equipment or soldiers left on the western side of the river, which includes the region’s capital, Kherson, and there were no losses of personnel or equipment during the withdrawal.
Pro-Russian bloggers covering war-related developments reported late Thursday that Russian forces crossing the river were coming under heavy fire from Ukrainian forces.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov told Reuters yesterday that Russia it will take at least a week to leave Chersona. He estimated that Russia still had 40,000 troops in the area, and said that intelligence indicated that its forces remained in and around the city.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an overnight message that Ukrainian forces had liberated 14 settlements as they advanced in the south, marking one of the fastest and most dramatic shifts in territorial control in the nearly nine months of war.
There was no sign of Russian forces when Reuters arrived in Blakhodatne, about 20 kilometers north of Kherson. Villagers said about 100 Russians held the village for eight months and throughout the occupation broke into homes whose residents had fled and ransacked them, stealing furniture, televisions, stoves and refrigerators. They had killed a man who had come too close to their trenches and captured two other men and a young woman, whose fate remains unknown. The Russians left in trucks without a fight on Wednesday night and Ukrainian troops arrived yesterday, Thursday, local residents said.
Yaroslav Yanusevych, the Ukrainian governor of Kherson, posted a video on Telegram of soldiers from the 59th Motorized Brigade marching through the liberated village of Blakhodatne, holding Ukrainian flags. In the nearby village of Posad Pokrovsky, destroyed buildings and a damaged truck on the highway to Kherson mark where the front line used to be. A Ukrainian flag flew at a bus stop, riddled with bullet holes. Homes and buildings on both sides of the road had been hit by fire while broken branches hung from tree trunks lining the highway. Ukrainian soldiers had set up checkpoints, hailing Ukrainian army vehicles passing by.
The already damaged Antonievsky Bridge – the only road crossing from Kherson to the Russian-controlled east bank of the Dnieper – collapsed, local residents said, according to Ukrainian state news network. This development will make it difficult for the Russian troops trying to escape while it will stop the march of the Ukrainian soldiers who want to follow them to the opposite bank.
The #Ukrainian flag flies over liberated Myrolyubivka, #Kherson region. pic.twitter.com/0zbMkK6hyT
— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) November 11, 2022
The third great Russian retreat
Is the third great Russian retreat in this war, and the first involving the abandonment of such a large occupied city. Moscow’s forces were driven from the suburbs of the capital Kyiv in March and from the northeastern region of Kharkiv in September.
Kherson province is one of four that Russian President Vladimir Putin said he annexed from Ukraine in late September. The loss of the province’s capital appears to put an end to dreams some Russians had of seizing Ukraine’s entire Black Sea coast, although Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the status of the annexed region remained unchanged.
❗️#Kherson right now. pic.twitter.com/e7Elxhxbbp
— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) November 11, 2022
Klapaya, #Kherson region is under #Ukrainian control. pic.twitter.com/GA1RbvHepg
— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) November 11, 2022
The settlement of Bilozerka, #Kherson region is being cleaned from #Russian trash. pic.twitter.com/7s4s1L2KxU
— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) November 11, 2022
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I am currently a news writer for News Bulletin247 where I mostly cover sports news. I have always been interested in writing and it is something I am very passionate about. In my spare time, I enjoy reading and spending time with my family and friends.
