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Russia has decided to withdraw its troops from the right bank of the Dnieper River, including the regional capital of Kherson. The Defense Ministry explained that it wants to avoid unnecessary losses among its forces and spare the lives of civilians.

While admitting that the decision is not an easy one, the commanders see little sense in keeping the troops on the right bank, the chief of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, General Army General Sergey Surovikin, told Defense Minister Sergey Schoigu on Wednesday. The general pointed to continued Ukrainian attacks on the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric dam on the Dnieper River, arguing that it could leave the Russian troops in Kherson cut off from the rest of the force with no way to escape.

A pullout would help save lives of the Russian soldiers and keep the combat effectiveness of the force grouping in the area, Surovikin said.

> This is a very difficult decision. Yet, we would be able to preserve the most important thing: lives of our soldiers.

“Start the pullback of forces,” Shoigu told Surovikin in a video released by media outlets. The minister ordered the general to organize secure relocation for both soldiers and civilians.

Over the past weeks, the local authorities have launched an effort to bring as many civilians as possible to the left bank of Dnieper, citing a threat posed by Ukrainian forces located on the opposite side. Over 150,000 people had been moved out of the city as of today, according to Sorovikin.

Russia incorporated Kherson Region last month, after residents voted in a referendum to break away from Ukraine and seek accession to Russia. Kiev rejected the vote as a “sham” and pledged to use military force to recapture all territories it considers to be under its sovereignty.

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> Some eagle-eyed viewers caught the inconsistency. The same footage – but with the slogans clearly visible – can be seen, for example, in a Deutsche Welle report on the situation in Cuba. Demonstrators declaring that “the streets belong to the revolutionaries” are probably not the kind of Cuban protesters that Senator Cruz had in mind.

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Iranian drone and ballistic missile plants should be destroyed, a senior aide to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has stated. This comes after Tehran acknowledged it had handed over military drones to Russia, though it’s insisted that this was before the Ukraine conflict broke out in late February.

“I believe it’s necessary to not only impose sanctions and embargoes, I believe that it could be possible to launch strikes on drones and ballistic missiles manufacturing facilities [in Iran]. Such a state cannot continue doing this with impunity,” Mikhail Podolyak stated on Friday, speaking live on local TV. The official did not elaborate on who, exactly, should launch such strikes against the Islamic Republic.

Allegations around purported arms deliveries from Iran to Russia surfaced in recent weeks, after Moscow began using new kamikaze drones en masse in Ukraine. Kiev insists that the drones, known as Geran-2 (Geranium-2), are actually Iranian-made Shahed-136 UAVs. The alleged drone deliveries have left a major dent in ties between Iran and Ukraine, with Kiev downgrading its diplomatic relations with Tehran. Iran says it supplied drones to Russia before Ukraine conflict READ MORE: Iran says it supplied drones to Russia before Ukraine conflict

Both Moscow and Tehran have repeatedly denied arms deliveries have taken place amid the conflict. On Saturday, however, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian admitted that his country had indeed “provided Russia with a small number of drones months before the Ukraine war.” He also denied claims that Iran had supplied Moscow with missiles.

Podolyak commented on this admission, expressing doubts that such an explanation was actually true. “That is, instead of destroying our critical infrastructure, [the drones] have been laying in warehouses for eight months?” he said.

Russia sent troops into Ukraine on February 24, citing Kiev’s failure to implement the Minsk agreements, designed to give the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk special status within the Ukrainian state. The protocols, brokered by Germany and France, were first signed in 2014. Former Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko has since admitted that Kiev’s main goal was to use the ceasefire to buy time and “create powerful armed forces.”

In February 2022, the Kremlin recognized the Donbass republics as independent states and demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join any Western military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked.

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The Ukrainian military fired US-made HIMARS missiles at the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric dam in Kherson Region on Sunday, damaging one of the floodgates, the emergency services told the media.

“The Armed Forces of Ukraine aren’t giving up on their attempts to destroy the dam of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station and create the circumstances for a humanitarian disaster,” a representative of the emergency services told RIA-Novosti.

Six missiles from a US-supplied HIMARS rocket launch system targeted the dam at around 10am local time. Five of them were intercepted by the Russian air defenses, but one made it through and hit a floodgate, the representative said.

The local authorities later clarified that the missile had failed to cause critical damage.

In recent weeks, Moscow has been blaming Kiev for attempting numerous attacks on the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric dam, which stands on the Dnieper River, upstream from the city of Kherson.

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The Russian authorities began relocating civilians from the city and areas on the right bank of the Dnieper last month. The caretaker governor of Kherson, Vladimir Saldo, explained that there was “an immediate danger of flooding in the territories due to the planned destruction of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric dam” by Ukrainian forces.

On Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said “those living in Kherson must be evacuated from the most dangerous zone of action. The civilian population must not suffer from shelling, any kind of offensive and counter-offensive, and other activities related to military operations.”

However, Ukraine has claimed that Russia had been planning to blow up the dam itself in a false-flag operation aimed at framing Kiev for the flooding. Those claims have been repeatedly denied by Moscow.

Kherson Region was officially declared part of Russia in early October, together with Zaporozhye Region and the People’s Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk, after people in those territories overwhelmingly supported the move in referendums.

In recent weeks, the Ukrainian military has repeatedly tried to advance on Kherson, but all of those attacks have been repelled.

On Sunday, Kirill Stremousov, the deputy head of the regional administration, said Kiev had been “deploying more and more APCs and tanks” near Kherson in what could be preparation for another offensive.