“The soldiers stole everything they could from the shops,” said a resident

Julia lives in the suburbs of this city with 300,000 inhabitants. She told franceinfo that she had seen Russian forces arrive in the middle of the night.

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On the eighth day of the war in Ukraine, new explosions were heard again in Kyiv tonight. And the Russian offensive therefore continues: Ukraine confirmed on Thursday, March 3, that the city of Kherson is now under Russian control after fierce fighting. With nearly 300,000 inhabitants, it was the first Ukrainian city of this size to fall into the hands of the Kremlin army.

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In franceinfo, Julia, a French-speaking Ukrainian woman who lives in the suburbs of this city with her husband and 8-year-old daughter, admits her grief to the Russian troops she saw arriving.

“There are a lot of shootings in Kherson. The shops are closed. No more drugs. The Russian army has stolen everything it can from stores, including alcohol. They also stole our national flag. We cannot leave because the city is surrounded by the Russian army. We do not leave home, we stay with our products. What will we have in two days, in five days? We don’t know.”

This was announced by the mayor of the city Igor Kolikhaev in a Facebook post after discussing witharmed guests”In an administrative building in Kherson, alluding, without naming them, Russian troops:”We had no weapons and we were not aggressive. We have shown that we are working to secure the city and we are trying to prevent the consequences of the invasion”, He specified.

This conquest of Kherson, a major city in southern Ukraine, is a strategic step forward: this city is on the road between Crimea, annexed in 2014 by Russia, and Ukrainian territory.