Budapest Post

Cum Deo pro Patria et Libertate
Budapest, Europe and world news

‘Power restored’ to Kherson, Russia ‘using old cruise missiles’

Electricity has been restored in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson after its liberation earlier this month from Russian occupation, a senior presidential aide said on Saturday.
“First we are supplying power to the city’s critical infrastructure and then immediately to household consumers,” Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential administration, wrote on the Telegram messaging app.

Ukrainian forces reclaimed the city on Nov. 11, but Euronews’ Anelise Borges reported from Kherson on Friday that there was still no electricity, heating or running water.

In recent days, Russian bombing of Kherson killed 15 civilians and wounded 35 more, including a child, local authorities said on Friday.

Galyna Lugova, an official of the city’s military administration, said on social media that several “private houses and high-rise buildings” had been damaged.

“The Russian invaders opened fire on a residential area with multiple rocket launchers. A large building caught fire,” Yaroslav Yanshevich, governor of the Kherson region, said earlier.

“Due to the constant Russian shelling, we are evacuating patients from hospitals in Kherson.”

Residents have been fleeing the city to the north and west to escape the attacks, seen as Russian retribution for Ukraine’s liberation of the city.

The Ukrainian Ministry of Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories said in the evening that a train had left Kherson for Khmelnytskyi “with the first 100 citizens of Kherson who benefited from the government evacuation, including 26 children, seven bedridden patients and six disabled people”.

The Russian withdrawal from Kherson, which Moscow had hoped to make its base in occupied southern Ukraine, has reshuffled the cards in the nine-month-old war.

The city is strategically located to link the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Russia since 2014, and the Ukrainian port of Odesa to the west.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said late on Friday that the number of people without power had been halved since the immediate aftermath of Russia’s assault this week.

But, he added, some six million were still cut off. In his nightly video address, he pleaded with Ukrainians to use energy sparingly. “If there is electricity, this doesn’t mean you can turn on several powerful electrical appliances at once,” he said.

Kyiv — with some 600,000 homes without electricity in the evening — and its region, as well as the provinces of Odesa in the south, Lviv and Vinnytsia to the west, and the central city of Dnipro, are the most affected by the cuts, Zelenskyy added.

The authorities on Friday gradually restored power on Friday, aided by the reconnection of the country’s four nuclear plants.

But the Russian attacks earlier in the week caused the worst damage so far in the conflict, leaving millions of people with no light, water or heat even as temperatures fell below zero.

National power grid operator Ukrenergo said several hours earlier that 30% of electricity supplies were still out, and asked people to cut back on their energy use.

“Repairs crews are working around the clock,” it said in a statement on Telegram.

Zelensky went to the town of Vyshhorod just north of Kyiv on Friday to look at a four-story building damaged by a Russian missile. He also visited one of the many emergency centers that have been set up to provide heat, water, electricity and mobile communications.

“Together we will be able to go through this difficult path for our country. We will overcome all challenges and we will definitely win,” he said earlier.

European officials, meanwhile, are scrambling to help Ukraine stay warm and keep functioning through the bitter winter months.

It’s estimated that around 50% of Ukraine’s energy facilities have been damaged in the recent Russian strikes targeting Ukraine’s power grid and other critical civilian infrastructure.

The European Union will step up efforts to provide Ukraine with support to restore and maintain power and heating, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Friday.

France is sending 100 high-powered generators to Ukraine to help people get through the coming months, French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna said on Friday. She accused Russia of “weaponizing” winter and plunging Ukraine’s civilian population into hardship.

Finnish economy minister Mika Lintila said Finland may send the first batch of energy equipment to Ukraine next week. Companies had overwhelmingly responded positively to a request for donations, he said on Twitter.

Belgium is to provide additional financial support of €37.4 million for Ukraine, according to the Belga news agency.

This week European officials launched a scheme called “Generators of Hope,” which calls on more than 200 cities across the continent to donate power generators and electricity transformers.

The generators are intended to help provide power to hospitals, schools and water pumping stations, among other infrastructure, but may provide only a tiny amount of the energy that Ukraine will need during the winter.

International human rights officials say Russia’s claims that it does not target civilians are difficult to reconcile with attacks on civil infrastructure.

“Millions are being plunged into extreme hardship and appalling conditions of life,” UN human rights chief Volker Turk said in a statement.

UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly, visiting Kyiv, said a promised air-defense package, which Britain valued at £50 million (€58 million), would help Ukraine defend itself against Russia’s bombardments.

“Words are not enough. Words won’t keep the lights on this winter. Words won’t defend against Russian missiles,” Cleverly said in a tweet about the military aid.

The package also includes 24 ambulances and 11 other emergency vehicles, some of them armored.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced in a video an additional €10 million in aid to support Ukrainian grain exports, which have been affected by the war.

Meanwhile, Moscow is probably removing nuclear warheads from old cruise missiles and firing the unarmed munitions at Ukraine, the UK Defense Ministry said in its latest intelligence update on the war.

Open source imagery shows wreckage of a cruise missile, designed in the 1980s as a nuclear delivery system, that had been shot down, the ministry said in a post on Twitter.

“Such an inert system... is unlikely to achieve reliable effects against intended targets,” it added. “Russia almost certainly hopes such missiles will function as decoys and divert Ukrainian air defenses.”

“Whatever Russia’s intent, this improvisation highlights the level of depletion in Russia’s stock of long-range missiles,” the bulletin concludes.

Also several European leaders traveled to Kyiv on Saturday for the annual commemorations of the Soviet-era famine of the 1930s known as the Holodomor, which Ukraine considers “genocide” committed by Stalin’s forces.

The prime ministers of Poland and Lithuania, Mateusz Morawiecki and Ingrida Simonyte, will also use the visit for talks about a possible new wave of immigration of Ukrainians to Europe this winter, reports say.

The Ukrainian border guard service confirmed that Morawiecki had “visited Kyiv and honored the memory of the victims of the Holodomor”.

Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo is also visiting the Ukrainian capital, his first trip there since the start of the Russian invasion.

The 90th anniversary of the famine known that left millions of Ukrainians dead during the winter of 1932-33 has taken on new resonance since the Russian invasion.

“The Russians will pay for all of the victims of the Holodomor and answer for today’s crimes,” Andriy Yermak wrote on Telegram, using the Ukrainian name for the disaster.

In November 1932, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin dispatched police to seize all grain and livestock from newly collectivized Ukrainian farms, including the seed needed to plant the next crop.

Millions of Ukrainian peasants starved to death in the following months, in what some historians have called premeditated mass murder.

The German parliament is to debate a resolution, tabled by the ruling coalition, next week to recognize the famine as a “genocide”.
AI Disclaimer: An advanced artificial intelligence (AI) system generated the content of this page on its own. This innovative technology conducts extensive research from a variety of reliable sources, performs rigorous fact-checking and verification, cleans up and balances biased or manipulated content, and presents a minimal factual summary that is just enough yet essential for you to function as an informed and educated citizen. Please keep in mind, however, that this system is an evolving technology, and as a result, the article may contain accidental inaccuracies or errors. We urge you to help us improve our site by reporting any inaccuracies you find using the "Contact Us" link at the bottom of this page. Your helpful feedback helps us improve our system and deliver more precise content. When you find an article of interest here, please look for the full and extensive coverage of this topic in traditional news sources, as they are written by professional journalists that we try to support, not replace. We appreciate your understanding and assistance.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Severe Heatwave Claims 2,300 Lives Across Europe
Declining Beer Consumption Signals Cultural Shift in Germany
Emails Leaked: How Passenger Luggage Became a Side Income for Airport Workers
Polish MEP: “Dear Leftists - China is laughing at you, Russia is laughing, India is laughing”
Western Europe Records Hottest June on Record
BRICS Expands Membership with Indonesia and Ten New Partner Countries
Elon Musk Founds a Party Following a Poll on X: "You Wanted It – You Got It!"
China’s Central Bank Consults European Peers on Low-Rate Strategies
France Requests Airlines to Cut Flights at Paris Airports Amid Planned Air Traffic Controller Strike
Poland Implements Border Checks Amid Growing Migration Tensions
Emirates Airline Expands Market Share with New $20 Million Campaign
Amazon Reaches Milestone with Deployment of One Millionth Robot
Yulia Putintseva Calls for Spectator Ejection at Wimbledon Over Safety Concerns
House Oversight Committee Subpoenas Former Jill Biden Aide Amid Investigation into Alleged Concealment of President Biden's Cognitive Health
Amazon Reaches Major Automation Milestone with Over One Million Robots
Extreme Heat Wave Sweeps Across Europe, Hitting Record Temperatures
Meta Announces Formation of Ambitious AI Unit, Meta Superintelligence Labs
Robots Compete in Football Tournament in China Amid Injuries
China Unveils Miniature Insect-Like Surveillance Drone
Marc Marquez Claims Victory at Dutch Grand Prix Amidst Family Misfortune
Germany Votes to Suspend Family Reunification for Asylum Seekers
Budapest Pride Parade Draws 200,000 Participants Amid Government Ban
Southern Europe Experiences Extreme Heat
Xiaomi's YU7 SUV Launch Garners Record Pre-Orders Amid Market Challenges
Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez's Lavish Wedding in Venice
Russia Launches Largest Air Assault on Ukraine Since Invasion
Massive Anti-Government Protests Erupt in Belgrade
Iran Executes Alleged Israeli Spies and Arrests Hundreds Amid Post-War Crackdown
Hungary's Prime Minister Criticizes NATO's Role in Ukraine
EU TO HUNGARY: LET THEM PRIDE OR PREP FOR SHADE. ORBÁN TO EU: STAY IN YOUR LANE AND FIX YOUR OWN MESS.
Hungarian Scientist to Conduct 30 Research Experiments on the International Space Station
NATO Members Agree to 5% Defense Spending Target by 2035
NATO Leaders Endorse Plan for Increased Defence Spending
U.S. Crude Oil Prices Drop Below $65 Amid Market Volatility
International Astronaut Team Launched to Space Station
Macron and Merz: Europe must arm itself in an unstable world
Germany and Italy Under Pressure to Repatriate $245bn of Gold from US Vaults
Iran Intensifies Crackdown on Alleged Mossad Operatives After Sabotage Claims
Trump Praises Iran’s ‘Very Weak’ Response After U.S. Strikes and Presses Israel to Pursue Peace
Oil Prices Set to Surge After US Strikes Iran
BA and Singapore Airlines Cancel Dubai Flights Amid Middle East Tensions
Trump Faces Backlash from MAGA Base Over Iran Strikes
Meta Bets $14 B on Alexandr Wang to Drive AI Ambitions
FedEx Founder Fred Smith, ‘Heart and Soul’ of the Company, Dies at 80
Chinese Factories Shift Away from U.S. Amid Trump‑Era Tariffs
Pimco Seizes Opportunity in Japan’s Dislocated Bond Market
Labubu Doll Drives Pop Mart to Status as China’s Most Valuable Toy Maker
Global Coal Demand Defies Paris Accord Goals
United States Conducts Precision Strikes on Iran’s Nuclear Sites
US strikes Iran nuclear sites, Trump says
×