Published: Just now
The residents of Russian-occupied Kherson are impatiently waiting for the Ukrainian army.
But they also know what will happen if the city is liberated:
– The Russians will immediately start bombing the city, especially residential buildings, parks and marketplaces, says Jekaterina, 27.
The exiled Russian newspaper Meduza has spoken with three residents of southern Ukrainian Russian-occupied Kherson. All three expect that the Ukrainian army will soon retake the city and that the Russian troops will disappear.
A majority of Kherson residents remain in the city despite the Russian occupiers urging the civilian population to leave the city, according to Sergej Chlan, who belongs to Kherson’s legal city administration. Only Ukrainians who collaborated with the Russians have chosen to leave the city, according to Chlan. One of the many who stayed is 27-year-old Jekaterina:
– I don’t want to live in Russia, I’m not crazy, she tells Meduza.
“Will immediately start bombing”
Yekaterina explains that she has lived in Kherson all her life and never intends to leave the city. Although she expects hell when the Ukrainian army retakes the city:
– Ever since the occupation began, we have understood that when we are liberated, Russia will immediately start bombing the city. I think they will especially target apartment buildings, parks and marketplaces, so that as many as possible are harmed. Then they will claim that Ukraine caused the damage, she tells Meduza.
Jekaterina and her family have already prepared a shelter in a basement. She has brought there books, and her mother has brought there a bottle of wine.
– We have even sewn clothes for the cat, winter is approaching, says Jekaterina.
Long queues at grocery stores
62-year-old Olga tells Meduza that there is a shortage of basically everything in Kherson’s shops and that the queues are long outside the grocery stores.
– In addition, it is impossible to exchange Ukrainian hryvnia. The speculators do not want to buy rubles because they know that in a few weeks this will be Ukraine again and then no one will want rubles anymore, says Olga.
57-year-old Viktor says that the number of Russian soldiers has increased lately in Kherson. He believes that it is partly about recently mobilized soldiers, partly about soldiers who have retired from the front.
– Many military vehicles move on the streets, especially at night. You can’t see them, but you can hear them, says Viktor to Meduza.
He also says that the propaganda posters with the messages “Russia is here forever” and “Kherson is a Russian city” have disappeared from the city’s streets. In the past, new ones were put up when residents tore them down, but that doesn’t happen anymore.
“Ideal place for traitors”
Viktor is also convinced that the Russians will bomb Kherson once the city is Ukrainian again:
– It is obvious that Russia will then raze the city to the ground from the other side of the Dnieper river. This is how it will go when they “evacuate” everyone, says Viktor to Meduza.
The Russian military headquarters in Kherson is reportedly being moved to the town of Genitjesk, near the Russian-occupied Crimean peninsula.
– It is an ideal place for traitors, who want to be able to quickly escape to Russia, away from the advance of the Ukrainian army, says the administrator Sergej Chlan, who hopes that he will soon be able to lead the liberated Kherson.
Chlan states that it is no longer possible to make calls to Russian mobile operators in Kherson.