Red Cross should save people in flooded occupied territories − Zelenskyy

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that international organisations, such as the Red Cross, should immediately join in evacuating people from flooded cities and villages, in particular in the temporarily occupied territory, where Ukrainian military and emergency workers cannot currently reach.

Source: Zelenskyy in his evening video address on 7 June

Quote: "Our military and special services are saving people as much as possible, despite the attacks. But large-scale efforts are needed.

It is necessary that international organisations, such as the International Red Cross, immediately join the rescue operation and help people in the occupied part of Kherson Oblast. Every person who died there is a verdict on the existing international architecture and international organisations that have forgotten how to save lives. "

Details: The president stressed that if now there is no international organisation in the zone of this disaster, it means that it "does not exist at all; it means that it is incapacitated".

He added that all relevant appeals from Ukraine, from the government in particular, were sent.

According to Zelenskyy, as of the evening of 7 June, over 2,000 people had been saved in Kherson and Mykolaiv oblasts.  

But the situation in the occupied territories is catastrophic because "the occupiers simply abandoned people in these terrible conditions without salvation, without water, just on the roofs of houses in flooded hromadas". [A hromada is an administrative unit designating a town, village or several villages and their adjacent territories – ed.]

The president stressed that this is another conscious crime of Russia: after the terrorist state caused the disaster, it also maximises the damage from it.

"Now we need a clear and quick reaction from the world to what is happening. It is even impossible to establish for certain how many people in the temporarily occupied territory of Kherson Oblast can die without salvation, without drinking water, without food or without medical care," said the president.

At the same time, Zelenskyy thanked those world leaders who expressed their "support for Ukraine and a clear condemnation of the Russian crime of ecocide" for "their integrity".

Previously: Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has stated that he is shocked by the reaction of the UN and the Red Cross to the blowing up of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant by the Russian occupiers.

Background:

• On the morning of 6 June, Russian occupation forces blew up the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (HPP). The dam and the power plant's turbine hall were completely destroyed. The hydroelectric power plant is beyond repair. Ukrhydroenergo, the national regulator, indicates that the reservoir is expected to be drained within the next four days.
• Water from the reservoir has begun to flood towns and villages, and evacuations of local residents from dangerous areas have begun. As a result of the explosion of the dam, problems began with the supply of water in Kryvyi Rih, Marhanets and Nikopol.
• President Volodymyr Zelenskyy emphasised that the recent disaster at the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant created by the Russians will not stop Ukraine from liberating its own territory, and neither has it increased the chances of the occupiers staying on this land.

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