City workers collect the body of a man after a Russian attack on Thursday
(Picture: AP)At least 32 people in the southern Ukrainian region of Kherson have been killed by Russian shelling since forces pulled out two weeks ago, the head of Ukraine’s police has said.
Russian forces completed their withdrawal from the city of Kherson on November 11 after an almost nine-month occupation. They are now positioned on the eastern bank of the Dnipro, from where they have been shelling the city regularly.
“Daily Russian shelling is destroying the city and killing peaceful local residents. In all, Russia has killed 32 civilians in the Kherson region since the deoccupation,” National Police chief Ihor Klymenko said on Saturday.
“Many people are evacuating to seek refuge in calmer regions of the country. But many residents remain in their homes, and we need to provide them with the maximum possible security,” he continued, saying police were once again on duty in the region.
Electricity in the city has been restored, a senior presidential aide said on earlier on Saturday.
Last week a senior official said Ukraine would soon begin evacuating people who want to leave the region.
Klymenko also said investigators had recorded a total of 578 of what he described as war crimes committed by Russian troops and their accomplices in the region. Moscow routinely dismisses allegations its forces have abused civilians.
Hundreds of civilians on Saturday escaped Kherson after days of intensive shelling.
“It is sad that we are leaving our home,” Yevhen Yankov told AP. “Now we are free, but we have to leave, because there is shelling, and there are dead among the population.”
Emilie Fourrey, emergency project co-ordinator for aid group Doctors Without Borders in Ukraine, said the evacuation of 400 patients of Kherson’s psychiatric hospital, which is situated near both an electrical plant and the frontline, had begun on Thursday and was set to continue in the coming days.
Russia has scaled up its attacks on critical infrastructure after suffering battlefield setbacks.
Prominent Russian nationalist said on Saturday that the Russian military does not have enough doctors, in what was a rare public admission of problems within the military.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian prime minister Denys Shmyhal said Ukraine, despite its own financial straits, has allocated 900 million hryvna (£20 million) to buy corn for Yemen, Sudan, Kenya and Nigeria.
In Kyiv, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said more than 3,000 specialists for a local utility continued to work “around the clock” and had succeeded in restoring heat to more than 90 per cent of residential buildings.
While about one-quarter of Kyiv residents remained without electricity, he said water services had been returned to all in the city.
