The Minister of Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories, Iryna Vereshchuk, called on residents of the temporarily occupied southern oblasts of Ukraine, especially Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, to evacuate as quickly as possible by all possible means.
She said this on the air of a nationwide telethon.
According to her, this should be done so that the Armed Forces of Ukraine can liberate these territories without endangering the civilian population.
Answering the question of whether there is a possibility of evacuation from the temporarily occupied territories of southern Ukraine, Vereshchuk noted that there is an evacuation and people know about it.
"The horizontal communication system works very well. Those who left have and know the ways, volunteers, we are involved. I wonʼt talk about it publicly now, because itʼs about peopleʼs safety," Vereshchuk answered.
She also said that the Russian occupiers prevent people from going to the territory controlled by Ukraine, and also use the civilian population as human shields, so citizens should still leave to give the Armed Forces of Ukraine the opportunity to liberate the land from the enemy.
"Our artillery must work because de-occupation includes armed use of force, we understand that," Vereshchuk emphasized and added that it is necessary to leave and evacuate their relatives by all available means.