Euronews: Russian General “Armageddon” is destroying the electricity and water infrastructure making the winter difficult for the Ukrainians
A statement issued by the Ukrainian government said, that Russia destroyed nearly a third of the country’s power stations in the past week after Moscow intensified a pre-winter campaign to hit infrastructure, a move the West says is a deliberate attempt to cause unrest and demoralize.
Moscow bombed power plants in Ukrainian cities with a population of millions of people, which also resulted in several deaths.
While Moscow acknowledges targeting only power stations, Ukraine says water infrastructure has also been damaged.
“The situation is currently critical across the country… All regions have to prepare for power, water and heating cuts,” Kirilo Tymoshenko, deputy chief of the Ukrainian president’s office, said in televised remarks.
The Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Russia continues to try to terrorize and kill civilians.
“Since October 10, 30% of Ukraine’s power stations have been destroyed, causing massive outages across the country,” Zelensky wrote on Twitter.
There were reports of power outages in parts of Kyiv and much of Zhytomyr to the west of the capital, and in Dnipro, which, like Mykolaiv, lies in the south but is also far from the front line where Ukraine is pressing Russian forces occupying areas in the southeast.
Zelensky renewed his refusal to negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who accused him of immorality.
“The terrorist state won’t achieve anything for itself with such actions,” Zelensky wrote on his Telegram channel.
It only confirms its subversive and murderous nature, and it will surely be held accountable for that”.
Putin describes Zelensky as a puppet of Washington, which has provided Kiev with more than $17.5 billion in security aid.
There was no immediate word on the death toll from Tuesday’s raids, which come a day after Russia launched swarms of drones to attack infrastructure in Kyiv and other cities, killing at least five people.
Moscow denies deliberately targeting civilians.
The Defense Ministry, whose forces were forced to retreat this month on two separate fronts, says the attacks are targeting military sites and energy infrastructure across Ukraine with high-precision weapons.
Earlier this month, Russia appointed General Sergei Sorovikin as the commander-in-chief of Moscow’s forces in Ukraine.
Sorovikin previously served in Syria and Chechnya, where Russian forces were pounding cities in a brutal yet effective scorched-earth policy against their opponents.
Russian media calls Sorovikin “General Armageddon” because of his reported power.
His appointment was followed by the largest wave of missile attacks against Ukraine since the invasion began on February 24.
Putin describes the strikes as retaliation for what he says was a Ukrainian attack on a bridge linking Russia with Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
At least three people died in the bombing, for which Ukraine has not officially claimed responsibility.
British Armed Forces Minister James Hebey told BBC radio that Sorovikin was adopting a brutal and futile strategy.
“The new general leading the Russian operation is wasting some of his most effective and valuable weapons systems against civilian targets hundreds of miles from… the frontline,” he added.
“He is doing this to create terror in an attempt to break the will of the Ukrainian people… I can promise him that it certainly won’t happen”.
The mayor of Zhytomyr, a city of 263,000 people, said Tuesday’s attacks had cut off electricity and water supplies.
Tymoshenko, deputy head of the Ukrainian president’s office, said that two explosions rocked a power plant in the city of Dnipro, which has a population of nearly one million, causing severe damage.
A Reuters witness heard explosions and saw plumes of smoke rising in the capital, Kyiv.
The Kyiv Prosecutor’s Office said two people were killed and another wounded in a Russian missile attack on an energy supply facility there.
