Dam Ukraine: Demining is a major concern as residents flee Kherson

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By James Waterhouse in Kherson and Thomas Mackintosh in London, BBC News June 7, 2023

Updated 3 hours ago

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Watch the devastation of the dam breach and the rescue attempts

The Red Cross has warned that breaching a major dam in southern Ukraine would have a catastrophic impact on the location of landmines.

Thousands of people have already been evacuated from parts of the Kherson region as water continues to flow into the Dnipro River that divides territory controlled by Russia and Ukraine.

Ukraine and Russia blame each other for sabotaging the Kakhovka Dam.

Three flood-related deaths have been reported in Russian-controlled Oleshky.

Yevn Ryschuk, the town’s exiled Ukrainian mayor, told public broadcaster Asoselny that he believed there would be more victims.

The BBC has not been able to verify the claims of the Ukrainian and Russian officials.

Erik Tolfsen, head of the Weapons Contamination Unit of the Red Cross, warned that the laid mines caused great fears not only for the residents of Kherson, but also for those who came to help.

“We knew where the risks were,” he told AFP. “Now we don’t know.

“All we know is that they are somewhere downstream.”

Natalia Homenyuk, spokeswoman for the Ukrainian military’s Southern Command, told Ukrainian TV: “Many anti-infantry mines [in Russian-seized areas] They were dislodged as floating mines.

“They pose a great danger,” she said, explaining that they would likely explode if they hit or collide with debris.

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Local residents tried to rescue pets and livestock from the flooded areas

The dam in Russian-controlled Nova Kakhovka was breached in the early hours of Tuesday, prompting mass evacuations as the water level downstream rose rapidly.

Officials say 30 towns and villages along the river have been flooded and nearly 2,000 homes in the city of Kherson – the capital of the Ukrainian-controlled region.

One of the women, who arrived in Kherson on a rescue boat from the eastern side of the Russian-occupied river, explained how quickly the situation had escalated after hearing about the disaster early Tuesday.

Katerina Krubic, 40, told the BBC: “We managed to collect our things, but the water kept rising. At that moment I was cooking buckwheat and my feet were already under water. It started flooding very quickly.”

“It’s like we lived an entire life in just one day.”

Interior Minister Ihor Klimenko said Ukrainians are developing a plan to help people on both sides of the Dnipro River.

“We’re saving everyone on the right [Ukrainian-controlled] The bank and a plan to help people to [Russian-held] left bank.”

He said that of the 30 flooded cities and villages, Ukraine controlled 20, and 10 was temporarily occupied by Russia.

Mr Klimenko also accused the Russians of leaving “people to fend for themselves”.

Rising waters were expected to peak in Kherson late Wednesday, but officials fear a catastrophic impact on agriculture as the vast Kakhovka reservoir – upstream of the dam – empties into the Black Sea.

The head of the Kherson region, Oleksandr Prokudin, said 1,700 people have been evacuated so far, while officials installed by the Kremlin on the other side of the river say 1,200 people have been moved to safety.

Officials say more than 40,000 people – 17,000 in Ukrainian-held territory west of the Dnipro and 25,000 in Russian-occupied east – need to leave.

UNICEF’s Damien Rance said the charity had seen homes completely destroyed as concerns persisted for trapped residents.

“The potable water has been affected in many of these locations as the water supply obviously came from the reservoir there, and also the electricity supply which was cut off.”

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Police, state emergency service and charity workers have been evacuating people since the dam burst

President Volodymyr Zelensky said earlier on Wednesday that hundreds of thousands of people across the Kherson region are without drinking water.

Both sides blame each other for the dam’s destruction.

Ukraine says it was mined by Russian forces, and accuses Russia of doing little to help people in the flooded areas of the Russian-occupied eastern bank of the river.

US Democratic Senator Bob Menendez, who chairs the influential Foreign Affairs Committee in the upper chamber, told the BBC he was “not sure yet” that Russia was responsible for blowing up the dam.

“But then the Russians again denied all the actions they had taken against critical infrastructure in Ukraine – and these are the actions that we know were taken by Russia,” he added.

Russia says the damage was caused by Ukrainian bombing, and President Vladimir Putin called it an “barbaric act” in a phone call with Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

This is the latest difficulty to hit the city of Kherson. It was occupied by Russian forces shortly after the war began last year, but Ukraine liberated it in November. Since then, the city has been bombed.

Victoria Yeremenko, 57, told the BBC her home was destroyed in February and she has moved into her son’s apartment, which is now flooded.

“We managed to get out,” she said. “There was a panic, and we had to leave quickly and grab the dogs. My brother is also half paralyzed.”

In recent years, the Kakhovka Dam has become a symbol of the pressure between Kiev and Moscow.

When Russia illegally annexed Crimea in 2014, Kiev closed the dam and cut off Ukraine’s southern peninsula from a major water source.

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Watch: Ross Atkins in … breaching the Ukraine Dam

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