A young woman wearing a traditional folk flower wreath holds a Ukrainian flag in central Kherson, Ukraine, Sunday, Nov. 13, 2022. The Russian retreat from Kherson marked a triumphant milestone in Ukraine's pushback against Moscow's invasion almost nine months ago. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
YUZHNE, Ukraine (AP) – Ukrainian media are reporting that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has visited the newly liberated southern city of Kherson.
The presidential office said it could not immediately confirm that Zelenskyy had travelled to Kherson and he himself had said Sunday on Facebook that he was in his office in Kyiv, the capital.
But he was photographed Monday posing with troops in a central Kherson square.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
YUZHNE, Ukraine (AP) – Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is accusing Russian forces of having committed “the same atrocities as in other regions of our country” before they were forced to pull out from the strategic southern city of Kherson and its surrounds.
In his nightly video address on Sunday, Zelenskyy said without details that “investigators have already documented more than 400 Russian war crimes, and the bodies of both civilians and military personnel have been found.”
“In the Kherson region, the Russian army left behind the same atrocities as in other regions of our country,” he said. “We will find and bring to justice every murderer. Without a doubt.”
The end of Russia’s eight-month occupation of Kherson city has sparked days of celebration but also exposed a humanitarian emergency, with residents living without power and water and short of food and medicines. Russia still controls about 70% of the wider Kherson region.
Zelenskyy said Russian soldiers who were left behind when their military commanders abandoned the city last week are being detained. He also spoke, again without details, of the “neutralization of saboteurs.”
Ukrainian police have called on residents to help identify people who collaborated with Russian forces.
Zelenskyy urged people in the liberated zone to also be alert for booby traps, saying: “Please, do not forget that the situation in the Kherson region is still very dangerous. First of all, there are mines. Unfortunately, one of our sappers was killed, and four others were injured while clearing mines.”
And he promised that essential services will be restored.
“We are doing everything to restore normal technical capabilities for electricity and water supply as soon as possible,” he said. “We will bring back transport and post. Let’s bring back an ambulance and normal medicine. Of course, the restoration of the work of authorities, the police, and some private companies are already beginning.”
Residents said departing Russian troops plundered the city, carting away loot as they withdrew last week. They also wrecked key infrastructure before retreating across the wide Dnieper River to its east bank. One Ukrainian official described the situation in Kherson as “a humanitarian catastrophe.”
Reconnecting the electricity supply is the priority, with gas supplies already assured, Kherson regional governor Yaroslav Yanushevych said.
The Russian pullout marked a triumphant milestone in Ukraine’s pushback against Moscow’s invasion almost nine months ago. In the past two months, Ukraine’s military claimed to have retaken dozens of towns and villages north of the city of Kherson.
Ukraine’s retaking of Kherson was the latest in a series of battlefield embarrassments for the Kremlin. It came some six weeks after Russian President Vladimir Putin annexed the Kherson region and three other provinces in southern and eastern Ukraine – in breach of international law – and declared them Russian territory.
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John Leicester contributed to this story from Kyiv, Ukraine.
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