The occupied Ukrainian city fears the false Russian referendum plans

After Russian forces withdrew from occupied areas around Kiev in early April, they left communities of fear and trauma behind. But in Kherson, a large city with a large shipbuilding industry, at the confluence of the Dnieper River of the Russian-annexed Crimea and the Black Sea, the occupying forces took a different path.

“The soldiers patrol and walk in silence. “They don’t shoot people in the streets,” Olga, a local teacher, said in a phone call last month after Russian forces closed the area. She only gave her name out of fear of revenge.

Although the city has so far been spared from the atrocities committed elsewhere, everyday life is anything but normal. All access denied. Kherson is running out of medicine, cash and lots of food, and Ukrainian officials warn the country could face a “humanitarian disaster”.

Without the delivery of cash to the Kherson banks, the circulation of the Ukrainian hryvnia is reduced, and credit card payments often fail. Access to Ukrainian television was blocked and replaced by Russian state channels. A strict curfew is in place.

Residents believe that Russian troops have not yet besieged or terrorized the city – as they did in Bucha and Mariupol – as they plan to hold a referendum on the so-called “Kherson People’s Republic” in the east, the pro-Russian separatist areas. Ukraine. Ukrainian human rights ombudsman Lyudmila Denisova said this month that the printing of ballot papers for the vote, which will take place in early May, has begun.

Addressing the nation on Friday, President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke directly to residents of occupied Kherson, accusing Russia of planning a referendum and warning them to protect personal data from attempts to cheat the vote. “That’s the truth.” Be careful, “he said.

Kherson Mayor Igor Kolikhayev said in an interview with Ukrainian television Zoom that such a vote would be illegal, as Kherson officially remains a part of Ukraine.

Russia is silent about its plans to hold a referendum in Kherson and Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko said this week that he was unaware of such a proposal.

But there is cause for concern. The controversial referendum in Crimea in 2014 was deemed rigged during the annexation of Russia, with nearly 97% of voters supporting Russia joining as a result.

A series of Russian moves this week added to the growing sense of panic in Kherson. On Monday, the mayor announced on social media that Russian troops had occupied the town hall, where the Ukrainian flag no longer flies. On Tuesday, the Russians replaced the mayor with their own appointees.

Earlier, a prominent Russian commander, Major General Rustam Minekaev, had announced plans to “take complete control” of Donbas, a predominantly Russian-speaking industrial center in southern and eastern Ukraine, to establish a land corridor to the Crimea. According to Ukrainian military intelligence, Russia plans to forcibly mobilize the local population, including doctors, to support the Russian war in the occupied southern regions.

Kherson is a strategically important city and a gateway to wider southern control. Russia could launch a stronger offensive from Kherson against other southern cities, including Odessa and Boxing Rich.

Volodymyr Fesenko, political analyst at the Penta Center in Kiev, says the softer behavior of the Russian army in Kherson is based on units from Crimea and ethnic Ukrainians in Donetsk and Lugansk, or on separatists with close ties to the region. There.

Out of town, but the situation around Kherson tells a very different story, with daily reports of kidnapping, torture, murder or rape. Thousands of people are deprived of electricity, water and gas.

“The situation in the Kherson region is much worse and much more tragic,” said local journalist Oleh Baturin. “Villages are easier to control; “They are vulnerable.”

Kherson Mayor Kolikhaev said Russian soldiers kidnapped local activists, journalists and war veterans and more than 200 people were kidnapped.

Among them was Baturin, who was arrested near his home in Kakhovka, 60 miles (90 kilometers) east of Kherson. He spent a week in solitary confinement and read every day; The soldiers asked for the identity documents of the organizers of the demonstration against the occupation, as well as of the local soldiers and veterans. He heard the sounds of torture from another cell.

After his release, he fled the occupied territories with his family.

Analyst Fesenko said the referendum plan showed Russia’s long-term intentions to occupy the region.

“Russia has had the support of the local population in Crimea and Donbas, but this is not the case in southern Ukraine, where Ukrainians want to live in Ukraine.” He said she.

During the first weeks of the occupation, thousands of people gathered every day in the main square of Kherson, carrying Ukrainian flags and signs reading “This is Ukraine”. Videos posted on social media showed people screaming at Russian tanks and heavily armed soldiers. Protests now take place weekly. On Wednesday, Russian troops used tear gas and stun grenades to disperse the protesters.

Mayor Kolikhayev said that after the referendum in Russia and the referendum on mobilization, there was a surge of panic over secession. The number of people wanting to leave our city has increased to five kilometers, ”Ercan said, adding that about a third of the city’s 284,000 people had fled.

After addressing the people of Zelensky, Olga sent a WhatsApp message to the AP: “The situation in Kherson is tense. My family and I want to break up … but now the Russian soldiers don’t allow it at all. “This place is getting more and more dangerous.”

Late Monday night, Kolikhayev wrote on Facebook that armed Russian soldiers broke into the Kherson City Hall building, took the keys and replaced the guards with their own.

He reposted the post on Tuesday, saying he refused to cooperate with the new Russian-appointed administration.

“I stay with the Khersonians in Kherson,” he writes. “I am with you.”