Ukraine works to stabilise Kherson after Russian pullout
ITV News' Sam Holder reports on the liberation of Kherson city
Ukraine's military carried out "stabilisation measures" near the southern city of Kherson on Saturday, following the end of an eight-month occupation by Russian forces.
The chief of the National Police of Ukraine, Ihor Klymenko, said that some 200 officers were at work in the city, setting up checkpoints and documenting evidence of possible war crimes.
Police teams are working to identify and neutralise unexploded ordnance, leaving one sapper injured while they were demining an administrative building, Mr Klymenko said.
Ukraine’s communications watchdog said national TV and radio broadcasts had resumed in the city, and an adviser to Kherson’s mayor said humanitarian aid and supplies had begun to arrive from the neighboring Mykolaiv region.
Speaking on Ukrainian TV, Roman Holovnya, described the situation in the city as "a humanitarian catastrophe". He said the remaining residents lacked water, medicine, and food.
ITV News Global Security Editor Rohit Kachroo reports on the aftermath of Russia's retreat
The chairman of Khersonoblenergo, the region's pre-war power provider, said electricity was being returned "to every settlement in the Kherson region immediately after the liberation and obtaining mandatory permission from the military".
In his nightly video address, Ukraine's President Volodomyr Zelenskyy said: "Even when the city is not yet completely cleansed of the enemy’s presence, the people of Kherson themselves are already removing Russian symbols and any traces of the occupiers’ stay in Kherson from the streets and buildings."
People across Ukraine awoke from a night of jubilant celebrating after the Kremlin announced its troops had withdrawn to the other side of the Dnieper River from Kherson, the only regional capital captured by Russia's military during the ongoing invasion.
ITV News Global Security Editor Rohit Kachroo said the developments mark the "most successful, most significant day for the Ukrainians so far".
Videos and photos on social media on Friday night showed residents jubilantly taking to the streets and a Ukrainian flag flying over a monument in a central Kherson square for the first time since the city was seized in early March. Some footage showed crowds cheering on men in military uniform.
In a regular social media update, the General Staff of Ukraine's armed forces said Russian forces were fortifying their battle lines on the river's eastern bank after abandoning the capital. About 70% of the Kherson region remains under Russian control.
The president hailed Friday as a "historic day", adding: "I thank every soldier and every unit of the Defence Forces who are making this offensive operation in the south possible now."
Ukrainian intelligence urged Russian soldiers who might still be in the city to surrender in anticipation of Ukrainian forces arriving. "Your command left you to the mercy of fate," it said in a statement.
Ukrainians cheered men in military uniform as residents took to the streets of Kherson
"Your commanders urge you to change into civilian clothes and try to escape from Kherson on your own. Obviously, you won’t be able to."
A Ukrainian regional official, Serhii Khlan, disputed the Russian Defence Ministry’s claim that the 30,000 retreating troops took all 5,000 pieces of equipment with them, saying "a lot" of hardware got left behind.
In the villages outside of Kherson, some people have not left their houses in the eight months since Russian soldiers began occupying the region.
ITV News' team in Ukraine were among the first people, outside of Ludmila Voznyak's village of Dudchany, that she has been able to speak to since Russia invaded.
Ludmila Voznyak, who lives in the now liberated village of Dudchany, spoke to ITV News and gifted them with grapes, which she had been growing during the Russian occupation
Ms Voznyak said: "All the time I knew our soldiers would come and we would win. When I saw them here I started crying. I hugged them, I kissed them because young kids are dying for no reason."
ITV News Global Security Editor Rohit Kachroo and his team then journeyed with Ukrainian troops that were heading towards Kherson.
Why is the liberation of Kherson such a prize for Ukraine?
Kherson, which had a pre-war population of 280,000, is the only regional capital to be captured by Russian forces. The city and surrounding areas fell into Moscow’s hands in the opening days of the war as Russian troops quickly pushed their attack north from the Crimean Peninsula - the region illegally annexed by the Kremlin in 2014.
Its loss was a major blow to Ukraine because of its location on the Dnieper River, near the mouth of the Black Sea, and its role as a major industrial centre. Ukrainian resistance fighters have challenged Russian troops for control of the city ever since, with acts of sabotage and assassinations of Moscow-appointed officials.
Kherson also sits at a point where Ukraine can cut off fresh water from the Dnieper to Crimea. Kyiv blocked those vital supplies after the Crimean Peninsula’s annexation, and Putin mentioned the need to restore them as one reason behind his decision to invade Ukraine.
The final Russian withdrawal came six weeks after President Vladimir Putin illegally annexed the Kherson region and three other Ukrainian provinces, vowing they would remain Russian forever.
On Friday, the Kremlin remained defiant, insisting the withdrawal in no way represented an embarrassment for Putin. Moscow continues to view the entire Kherson region as part of Russia, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
He added that the Kremlin doesn’t regret holding festivities just over a month ago to celebrate the annexation of occupied or partially occupied regions of Ukraine.
The General Staff of Ukraine’s army said the Russian forces left looted homes, damaged power lines and mined roads in their wake.
Some quarters of the Ukrainian government barely disguised their glee at the pace of the Russian withdrawal.
“The Russian army leaves the battlefields in a triathlon mode: steeplechase, broad jumping, swimming,” Andriy Yermak, a senior presidential adviser, tweeted. Social media videos showed villagers hugging Ukrainian troops.
Recapturing Kherson city could provide Ukraine a strong position from which to expand its southern counteroffensive to other Russian-occupied areas, potentially including Crimea, which Moscow seized in 2014.
From its forces' new positions on the eastern bank, however, the Kremlin could try to escalate the war, which US assessments showed may already have killed or wounded tens of thousands of civilians and hundreds of thousands of soldiers.
General Ben Hodges, former commanding general of US Army forces in Europe, described the retreat from Kherson as a "colossal failure" for Russia, and said he expects Ukrainian commanders will work to keep the pressure on Russia’s depleted forces ahead of a possible future push for Crimea next year.
"It’s too early to be planning the victory parade, for sure. But I would expect by the end of this year - so in the next, let’s say, eight weeks - the Ukrainians are going to be in place to start setting the conditions for the decisive phase of this campaign, which is the liberation of Crimea, which I think will happen by the summer," he said.
In an intelligence update posted on social media on Saturday morning, the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) said Moscow’s troops had "highly likely" destroyed road and rail bridges over the Dnipro River as part of their retreat.
"Kherson was the only regional capital city captured since February by Russian forces so the withdrawal brings significant reputational damage," it said.
"The withdrawal is a public recognition of the difficulties faced by Russian forces on the west bank of the Dnipro River.
"It is likely that Ukraine has retaken large areas of Kherson oblast on the west bank of the Dnipro River, and that its forces are now largely in control of Kherson city itself."
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