More of 2,700 people were evacuated from flooded areas after the destruction of a dam near the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson for an attack of which Ukraine and Russia They accused each other, authorities reported.
A spokesman for the Ukrainian emergency services told a local television channel that more than 1,450 people were evacuated from Ukrainian-controlled areas along the Dnieper riverbank after the destruction of the Kakhovka.
“There is currently no information on deaths or injuries,” said the spokesman, Oleksandr Khorunzhyiadding that the water level in the city of Kherson had risen five meters.
The destruction of this dam will cause “one of the worst environmental catastrophes of the last decades”, criticized the Ukrainian prime minister, Denys Shmyhalwho insisted on accusing Russia.
“Dozens of cities and towns will find themselves with problems of drinking water, of access to water supplies for irrigation,” the premier said in a remote speech at an OECD meeting, reported the AFP news agency.
Russiawhich partially occupies Kherson province and even fully annexed it last year, said the dam, which supplies water to the southern Crimean peninsula that Moscow annexed in 2014, was blown up by Ukraine.
For their part, the authorities installed by Russia in Khersonquoted by the Russian media, reported 1,274 people evacuated so far from areas on the banks of the Dnieper under Russian rule.
People rescued from the roofs of houses
Tatiana Kuzmichdeputy governor of the Kherson region close to Moscow, indicated that this number included 38 people who had to be rescued from the roofs of their houses. Other neighbors were still blocked in similar situations.
“According to Emergencies Ministry data, 1,274 were rescued, 32 of them disabled,” he told Russian state television.
Some 350 people were in temporary shelters, it added.
Authorities said some 22,000 people live in flood risk areas in Russian-controlled areas on the east side of the river.
Another 16,000 live in the most critical area of the territory controlled by Ukraine on the western side.
The UN He said at least 16,000 people have already lost their homes and efforts are underway to provide clean water, money, and legal and emotional support to those affected.
Evacuees on the Ukrainian-controlled side of the river were transferred to cities such as Mykolaiv and Odessa, further west.
“While towns and villages downstream of the Dnieper River are submerged, the human and environmental cost of the destruction of the Kajovka dam is a huge humanitarian disaster,” said Amnesty International’s Eastern Europe Director.
“The international community must come together to bring those responsible to justice. Dams are specifically protected under international humanitarian law because of the dangers their destruction poses to civilians,” added Marie Struthers.
The spokesman for the UNStephane Dujarric, said that the flooding caused by the dam breach “was estimated to have serious and longer-term consequences on the humanitarian situation, such as the movement of mines and explosive devices to new areas.
Source: Ambito
