The deputy head of the Russian-installed administration in Ukraine’s occupied Kherson region, Kirill Stremousov, said in a telephone interview that “everything in Kherson was under control,” claiming that Ukrainian spies and saboteurs were killed near Kherson’s Tavriiskyi neighbourhood on Tuesday.
Earlier in the day, reports emerged that Stremousov had left Kherson after a video he posted appeared to indicate that he was located in Voronezh, a Russian city some 600 miles from Kherson.
When asked by the Guardian about his location, Stremousov said that he was currently “travelling around Russian cities, meeting different people for work”.
He said:
I don’t have to sit [in Kherson]. I am the deputy head of the region and have the opportunity to move around…These are working trips.
“Kherson will remain my base,” he added, denying that he left Kherson out of safety concerns.
Stremousov became the most senior Russian-appointed official in Kherson after the local governor, Volodymyr Saldo, was taken to hospital amid a suspected poisoning earlier in the summer.
Stremousov’s apparent departure from Kherson comes after another Russian-appointed official in the region, Alexei Kovalev, was shot dead in his home over the weekend.
In the past months, a number of Ukrainian nationals appointed by Russian forces in occupied territory have been killed or wounded in apparent partisan attacks.
Uit The Guardian