Putin: “Kakhovka dam attack a ‘barbaric act’

Russian President Vladimir Putin has called the attack on the Russian-occupied Kakhovka dam a “barbaric act”, in his first public reaction to the situation.

Mr Putin told Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan in a phone call that the breach was “a barbaric act which has led to a large-scale environmental and humanitarian catastrophe”, the Kremlin said in a statement.

The breach of the dam in southern Ukraine, which provides cooling water for Europe’s largest nuclear plant, took place as Ukrainian troops prepared to go on the offensive to recover lost territory.

Both Ukraine and Russia are blaming each other for the disaster.

Russia claimed that Ukraine sabotaged the dam to distract attention from the new counteroffensive it said was “faltering”.

Ukraine has suggested Moscow blew it up to try to prevent Ukrainian forces crossing the Dnipro in their attack.

Earlier, a senior Ukrainian official warned of the danger posed by floating mines unearthed by flooding and the spread of disease and hazardous chemicals as he inspected damage caused by the collapse of the dam.

Visiting the city of Kherson on the Dnipro river, Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov said more than 80 settlements had been affected in the disaster.

Although it denies blowing up the dam, Moscow has engaged in a campaign of air strikes against Ukraine’s energy system in which Kyiv says infrastructure of other dams has been damaged.

Blaming the dam’s collapse on Russia, Mr Kubrakov said: “They did it in order to free up troops in this direction by flooding this bit of the frontline.”

Regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin said the water had reached a depth of 5.34 metres in some places of Kherson, though he said the rise had slowed and could peak by the end of today.

In Kherson, a large city about 60km downstream from the destroyed dam, residents have set up makeshift embarkation points for dinghies that police, rescue workers and volunteers are now using to get around.

 

Kherson faces the Russian-controlled eastern bank of the Dnipro, and some residents have come under fire from Russian artillery as they go about their rescue and recovery work.

The thud of artillery is heard almost constantly in the distance. “Water is disturbing mines that were laid earlier, causing them to explode,” Mr Kubrakov said.

As a result of the flooding, infectious diseases and chemicals were getting into the water, he added.

Mr Kubrakov said Ukraine had allocated 120 million hryvnias (€3.03million) to secure the water supply in Mykolaiv, another southern city, and 1.5 billion hryvnias had been set aside to rebuild water supply systems ruined by the flood.

 

Ukrainian authorities have evacuated people from 24 flooded settlements and at least 20 settlements are flooded on territory occupied by Russian forces, he said.

Kherson, a city of 279,000 before Russia’s full-scale invasion in February last year, was occupied by Russian forces for over eight months until November.

“We see that the occupation authorities are not evacuating people,” Mr Kubrakov said, calling for the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross to help evacuate flood victims in occupied regions.

Mr Kubrakov said the water level in the city had risen by 12-16cm an hour yesterday but was now rising at 1-2cm an hour.

“It’s one of the most terrifying terrorist acts of this war,” he said.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said this morning that the destruction of the dam had left hundreds of thousands of people without normal access to drinking water.

“The destruction of one of the largest water reservoirs in Ukraine is absolutely deliberate … Hundreds of thousands of people have been left without normal access to drinking water,” he said on the Telegram messaging app.

UN aid chief Martin Griffiths told the Security Council that the dam breach “will have grave and far-reaching consequences for thousands of people in southern Ukraine on both sides of the front line through the loss of homes, food, safe water and livelihoods”.

“The sheer magnitude of the catastrophe will only become fully realised in the coming days,” he said.

At least seven people have been missing after waters from the destroyed Nova Kakhovka dam flooded nearby areas, Russia’s TASS news agency cited the Moscow-installed mayor of the city of Nova Kakhovka as saying this morning.

Ukrainian officials estimated about 42,000 people were at risk from the flooding.

 

In Kherson city yesterday, buses, trains and private vehicles were marshalled to carry people to safety in about 80 communities threatened by flooding.

Cracks of incoming artillery sent people trying to flee running for cover. In the evening, Reuters reporters heard four incoming artillery blasts near a residential neighbourhood where civilians were evacuating.

The Kazkova Dibrova zoo on the Russian-held riverbank was completely flooded and all 300 animals were dead, a representative said via the zoo’s Facebook account.

“More and more water is coming every hour. It’s very dirty,” a woman in Nova Kakhovka, said by telephone.

 

The United States said it was uncertain who was responsible, but the deputy US ambassador to the UN, Robert Wood, told reporters it would not make sense for Ukraine to destroy the dam and harm its own people.

The Geneva Conventions ban targeting dams in war because of the danger to civilians.

The dam supplies water to a wide area of southern Ukrainian farmland, including the Russian-occupied Crimean peninsula, as well as cooling the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant.

Satellite images taken yesterday afternoon by Maxar Technologies showed houses and other buildings submerged, many with only their roofs showing.

Maxar said the images of more than 2,500sq/km between Nova Kakhovka and the Dniprovska Gulf, southwest of Kherson city on the Black Sea, showed numerous towns and villages flooded.

 

As Kyiv prepares for its long-awaited counteroffensive, some military analysts said the flooding could benefit Russia by slowing or limiting any Ukrainian advance along that part of the front line.

The UN nuclear watchdog said the Zaporizhzhia plant, upriver on the reservoir, should have enough water to cool its reactors for “some months” from a separate pond.

In a boost for Ukraine’s military, Mr Zelensky said he had received “a serious, powerful” offer from countries ready to provide F-16 fighter jets.

“Our partners know how many aircraft we need,” Mr Zelensky was quoted as saying in a statement on his website.

“I have already received an understanding of the number from some of our European partners … It is a serious, powerful offer.”

Kyiv now awaited a final agreement with its allies, including “a joint agreement with the United States,” Mr Zelensky said.

It is not clear which of Ukraine’s allies are ready to provide it with the jets.