Authorities in the Ukrainian capital have begun planning a total evacuation of the population, estimated at around three million, if Russian bombing of infrastructure continues and causes a total power outage, The New York Times assured this Sunday.
City authorities are struggling to maintain a power grid already badly damaged by Russian missiles, the paper says, noting that the situation is already dire, with 40% of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure damaged or destroyed.
According to the paper, city officials are installing 1,000 heated shelters that can act as “bunkers” as engineers attempt to repair infrastructure bombed by Russian troops.
To prevent the electricity grid from completely shutting down, Ukraine’s national energy company said on Saturday it would continue to impose continuous power outages in seven regions of the country.
The damage done so far by the Russian attacks has “caused new suffering among Ukrainian citizens and forced the authorities to consider the possibility that further damage would prevent them from providing basic services,” the paper said.
“We understand that if Russia continues with these attacks, we could lose the entire electrical system,” Roman Tkachuk, security director of the Kiev municipal government, told the US newspaper.
The official added that authorities in the capital had been informed that they would likely receive at least a 12-hour warning if the network was about to go down.
When that time comes, Tkachuk said, “we will start informing people and ask them to leave the city”.
For now, the situation is “manageable” and there are no signs of large numbers of citizens leaving the capital, but that could soon change if services that rely on power entering the city are disrupted, the official said.
“If there is no electricity, there will be no water or sewage,” he said. “That is why the government and the municipality are currently taking all possible measures to protect the energy supply system,” he added.
The Russian military spent weeks bombing critical infrastructure across Ukraine, leading to water, electricity and gas cuts, raising concerns for the Kiev government ahead of the approaching winter.
The military offensive launched by Russia on February 24 in Ukraine has already resulted in more than 13 million people fleeing — more than six million internally displaced persons and more than 7.7 million to European countries — according to the latest data from the UN, which ranks this refugee crisis as the worst in Europe since World War II (1939-1945).
The Russian invasion – justified by Russian President Vladimir Putin, with the need to “denazify” and demilitarize Ukraine for Russia’s security – was condemned by the generality of the international community, which has responded by sending arms to Ukraine and Russia of political and economic sanctions.
Source: DN
