Russia has “stepped up preparations” for the forced evacuation of civilians from the occupied regions of southern Ukraine to Crimea at the end of the month, the Ukrainian military said, news.sky.com reports.
The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reported in a Telegram post that officials appointed by Russia conducted a “survey of the local population” in the cities of Melitopol, Zaporizhzhia and Skadovsk in the Kherson region.
It stated that during the investigation, the “presence of a Russian passport, registration and level of education” were checked.
“Buses are periodically dispatched with those wishing to evacuate,” the General Staff stated.
The occupiers are spreading information that the forced evacuation of the civilian population will begin at the end of April.
Yesterday, the Ukrainian military said that Russia is using violent methods to force civilians in the occupied zones to obtain Russian passports.
Currently, Russia occupied the territory on the eastern bank of the Dnieper in the Kherson region and most of the Zaporizhia region.
Fear of a counteroffensive: 3,000 Russian soldiers allegedly called the “surrender hotline” last month
The figure represents a sharp increase in the number of Russian soldiers who have been called to surrender or surrender their units to the Ukrainian military, said a spokesman for a hotline set up to facilitate the surrender and killing of unwilling Russian soldiers.
Vitaly Matvienko noted that 3,000 calls more than doubled the monthly figures of February.
In Ukraine, it is believed that this increase may be related to the Ukrainian counteroffensive, which, according to popular assumptions, will take place in the spring.
“The Ukrainian counteroffensive operation on the ground has not yet begun, but its results are already yielding results,” the message says.
The “I want to live” hotline became operational in September 2022.
Russian subscribers are promised to be detained according to the Geneva Convention.
It is believed that more than 10,000 people have called this number to date.
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Source: Hot News
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