Klitschko warns Kyiv may face blackouts – DW – 11/06/2022

Kyiv faces possible blackouts and cuts to its water supply and heating network caused by Russian strikes on the power grid, the city’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, told Ukrainian state television. Residents of the capital should conserve supplies and consider moving out temporarily, Klitschko said. 

He described this as a worst-case scenario. “We are doing all we can to ensure that things do not come to this,” he said.

“But we want to be open. Our enemies are doing all they can to leave this city without heating, without electricity and without water supply — in short so that we all die,” the Kyiv mayor said. 

He put the number of residents in the city at around 3 million, including 350,000 internally displaced persons. 

Kyiv is attempting to stabilize its power grid by phased blackouts that leave parts of the city in darkness for a number of hours and is setting up 1,000 communal warming facilities in case the district heating network goes down. 

Klitschko, famous as a former heavyweight world boxing champion, accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of aiming to destroy Ukraine as a nation. “Putin does not need us Ukrainians. He needs the region, he needs a Ukraine without us,” he said.

Russia launched an invasion of neighboring Ukraine on February 24 and has since illegally declared four regions in the south and east to be part of Russian territory.

Here are the other main headlines from the war in Ukraine on Sunday, November 6:

Russia claims Nova Kakhovka dam damaged by Ukrainian forces

Ukraine’s Russian-held Nova Kakhovka dam was damaged in shelling by Ukrainian forces, Russian news agencies reported.

Russian state-owned news agency TASS quoted a representative of the emergency services as saying that a rocket launched by a US-made HIMARS missile system had hit the dam’s lock.

The official quoted said it was an “attempt to create the conditions for a humanitarian catastrophe” by breaching the dam. The reports provided no evidence to support the allegation.

The vast Nova Kakhovka dam, which blocks the Dnieper River upstream of Kherson where Ukrainian forces have been making advances, has taken on vital strategic significance in recent weeks.

Both Russia and Ukraine have since October repeatedly accused each of planning to breach the dam using explosives, in a move that would flood much of the area downstream in what would likely cause major destruction around Kherson city.

Ukraine’s ambassador in Berlin stresses nuclear warnings to Putin

Ukraine’s new ambassador to Germany has warned against dismissing the threat that Russia could use nuclear weapons in the current conflict, in remarks made to the German media. 

“Russian President Vladimir Putin must be told that the use of nuclear weapons is not an option,” Oleksii Makeiev told the Funke Media Group of newspapers. 

Russia had to be confronted from a position of strength, the ambassador said. “Otherwise, Moscow will always go further.” 

Makeiev said that after the annexation of the Crimean Peninsula, Germany had been frightened of provoking Russia. Ukraine had been left on its own, and the outcome could now be seen, he said.

US privately asks Ukraine to show openness to dialogue

The Washington Post reports US President Joe Biden’s administration is encouraging Ukraine’s leadership to show openness for dialogue with Russia as Russia’s war against Ukraine continues into in its eighth month.

The request is not meant to bring Ukraine to the negotiating table, the report said, citing unnamed officials familiar with the discussions. Instead, it is a strategic move to ensure Ukraine maintains support from the international community wary of sustaining a war effort against Russia as food and energy markets have felt the consequences in the form of a volatile economic outlook worldwide.

The United States — like the European Union — has publically vowed to support Ukraine against Russian aggression for “as long as it takes.” However, some Republican candidates running in US midterm elections have said they will reduce support for Ukraine. 

Behind the scenes, US officials reached the conclusion that Russian President Vladimir Putin, for now, is not serious about negotiations. Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s ban on dialogue worried parts of Europe, Africa and Latin America where the war’s economic effects are most apparent.

External power restored in Russia-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant

After using emergency diesel generators for two days, the electricity supply has now been restored to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in a statement. The plant is located in the southern part of Ukraine currently occupied by Russia.

This is not the first time the nuclear plant has lost external power during the conflict in Ukraine. Though not operational, the plant still needs electricity to prevent a nuclear accident.

“The repeated power outages all too clearly demonstrate the extremely serious nuclear safety and security situation this major nuclear power plant is facing,” IAEA director general Rafael Grossi said.

More from DW’s coverage of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine

Ukrainians are scrambling to repair buildings damaged by Russia. DW reporter Oleh Klymchuk visited villages in northern Ukraine that national forces liberated in spring to see how reconstruction efforts are coming along.

dh, mk/sms (AP, AFP, Reuters, dpa)