Employees of the Ministry of Emergency Situations blocked volunteers' access to the occupied left bank of the Kherson region, including the flooded city of Oleshki, where more than 600 people are left without food, water and medicine. The volunteers themselves told The Insider about this.
“The entry and exit of people is impossible, boaters are not allowed. One of the volunteers who made his way there says that this is due to the fact that there are a lot of corpses. Also, people remain blocked in the center of Oleshek. This is 600 people in the hospital and some in the school and the house of culture. The evacuees are left without food and water. Now we are trying to establish logistics in order to send medicines and insulin, food, water, blankets, generators there. It is not yet clear whether we will be able to do this or not,” said one of the volunteers.
According to her, the Ministry of Emergency Situations put forward an ultimatum: they are ready to let an intermediary from the locals with a Russian passport to the blocked people to hand over medicines and other necessary things. “The Ministry of Emergency Situations put forward its proposals to us that we need cooperation with the locals. That is, to find a local resident of sound mind, younger than 60 years old and with a Russian passport,” the interlocutor explained.
Vladimir Saldo, the Russian-appointed "head" of the Kherson region, wrote that the death toll in the Russian-occupied territory had risen to eight people. According to him, the Russian authorities evacuated more than 5.8 thousand people from the flooded areas. He also reports that 22,000 houses in 17 settlements were flooded.
Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Igor Klymenko announced five deaths due to flooding. Four people died in Kherson, 13 more are considered missing. One more dead — in the Nikolaev area. In addition, he writes that in Kherson, 11 people were injured from shelling during the evacuation. At the moment, 2412 people have been evacuated from there, 825 people from the Nikolaev region.
In the Kherson region, 48 settlements were flooded: 34 on the territory of the right bank controlled by Ukraine, 14 on the occupied left bank.
Meanwhile, the day before, volunteer Elena told The Insider that more than 30 people died on Nizhnyaya Street in Oleshki alone during the flood. “This street has already gone to the bottom, the chances of saving someone there are very small,” she added.
According to Elena, Russian rescuers check the documents of residents, and they do not help those who present Ukrainian passports. Volunteers who are trying to get into the city on their boats are offered to give them to representatives of the Ministry of Emergency Situations. The Insider correspondent called Oleshek's rescue service under the guise of a local resident and asked if they were evacuating people without Russian passports, to which he was told: "Of course."
The fact that the Russian military and the Ministry of Emergency Situations do not allow volunteer rescuers into the disaster zone was previously told by two more volunteers to The Insider. They say they are trying to remotely coordinate people in the disaster area so that those with boats help others get to dry areas.