The news of the arrival of conscripts to reinforce Russian occupation forces in the area was provided by Ukraine’s General Staff, the Ukrainska Pravda website reported on Friday.
Russia sends reinforcements as Ukrainian forces advance
In its latest operational update on the Russian invasion, published on Friday, Ukraine’s military command wrote: “According to the available information, up to 2,000 people from among the russian mobilised people arrived in the temporarily captured territory of the Kherson region to replenish losses and strengthen units on the contact line.”
Ukraine’s General Staff also reported that the Russian-installed administration of the Kherson region “issued an order to prepare evacuation for the so-called ‘banking institutions’” and “prepared evacuation lists of imported russian medical workers and teachers."
The news comes after Russian occupation authorities this week began "evacuating" civilians from the regional capital Kherson City, ahead of an expected Ukrainian attempt to retake the city, according to news outlets.
Russian sources on Thursday indicated that Ukrainian troops had advanced in the Kherson region as Ukrainian forces continued their interdiction campaign, the Institute for the Study of War, a US think tank, reported on Thursday night.
Russia plans terrorist attack on hydro plant: Zelensky
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday warned that Russia had mined “the aggregates and dam of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant” on the Dnipro river in Kherson province, in preparation for the Kremlin’s “next terrorist attack.”
Speaking via video link to a European Union summit in Brussels, Belgium, Zelensky said that if Russia blew up the Kakhovka dam, “more than 80 settlements will be in the zone of rapid flooding,” including Kherson City, the regional capital.
Ukraine’s president appealed to the international community to convey to Russia that a possible terrorist attack on the Kakhovka plant would be the same as using weapons of mass destruction, with corresponding consequences for Moscow, and urged Kyiv’s foreign partners to take preventive measures, Ukrainska Pravda reported.
“The world must react preventively,” Zelensky urged. "This is key now."
According to the Institute for the Study of War, “Russian sources are likely setting information conditions for Russian forces to blow the dam after they withdraw from western Kherson Oblast and accuse Ukrainian forces of flooding the Dnipro River and surrounding settlements, partially in an attempt to cover their retreat further into eastern Kherson Oblast.”
The Washington-based think tank added: “Continued Russian preparation for a false-flag attack on the Kakhovka HPP is also likely meant to distract from reports of Russian losses in Kherson Oblast.”
Ukrainian forces destroy Russian ammunition storage sites
Meanwhile, Ukrainian forces blew up two Russian ammunition storage sites in the south of Ukraine, Ukrainska Pravda reported on Friday, citing the Ukrainian army’s Operational Command South.
The resulting losses of the Russian army included: 28 military personnel; 2 Msta-S self-propelled howitzers; a mortar; an armoured combat vehicle; and a tank, according to the Ukrainian army.
Ukrainian troops also destroyed a Russian command and surveillance post near the village of Borozenske, Kherson region, Ukrainska Pravda reported.
The remaining losses inflicted on the Russian side were being ascertained, Ukrainian defence officials said on Facebook, adding that two armoured combat vehicles and other military vehicles were damaged as well.
In addition, the Ukrainian Air Force carried out seven air strikes, targeting Russian air defence positions, ammunition storage facilities, and areas where Russian equipment was concentrated; while Rocket Forces and Artillery performed close to 110 firing missions, according to Ukrainska Pravda.
Meanwhile, Russian forces used army and assault aircraft to attack Ukrainian positions three times in the Beryslav district of Kherson province, but they came under fire and retreated, the Ukrainian army said.
On Thursday evening, the Antonivka Bridge in Kherson, and a nearby crossing built by the Russian occupation authorities, came under renewed shelling, according to Ukrainska Pravda.
Russian strikes on Kharkiv, Bakhmut, Zaporizhzhia
Elsewhere in Ukraine, at least six people were injured after Russia struck an industrial enterprise in the northeastern city of Kharkiv on Friday morning, the kyivindependent.com website reported, citing regional governor Oleh Syniehubov.
Emergency operation was under way, and information about damage and casualties was being clarified, Syniehubov said.
He added that Russia also struck Kupiansk, Vovchansk and several other settlements in the Kharkiv region, injuring three people.
Meanwhile, in the past 24 hours, Russian forces have killed two people and wounded one in the eastern city of Bakhmut, Donetsk region, the region’s Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said on Friday.
Nine more civilians killed by Russian troops during the occupation have been found in liberated Lyman and Novoselivka, according to Kyrylenko, kyivindependent.com reported.
Russia on Friday morning also hit the southeastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia with S-300 missiles, injuring three people and damaging a residential building, a school, and critical infrastructure sites, said Zaporizhzhia Oblast Governor Oleksandr Starukh, as cited by kyivindependent.com.
In a Facebook post on Friday, Ukraine’s General Staff estimated that over the previous 24 hours, Russian forces had launched at least three missiles, carried out 24 air strikes, and shelled over 15 settlements.
Friday is day 240 of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
(pm/gs)
Source: PAP, understandingwar.org, pravda.com.ua, facebook.com/GeneralStaff/ua, kyivindependent.com