• Putin supports population evacuation.
• He aspires retreating from Ukrainian port city Kherson.
• Moscow has been evacuating residents from the west bank of the Dnipro river.

Putin has actively supported population evacuation in hopes of retreating from Ukrainian port city Kherson.

‘Those who live in Kherson should be withdrawn from the zone of the most dangerous actions, since the civilian population should not suffer,’ the Russian president urged as Ukraine’s military steadily reclaim land on the outskirts.

He addressed pro-Kremlin activists on Russia’s National Unity Day.

Moscow has been evacuating residents from the west bank of the Dnipro river and added a nine-mile buffer zone on the east bank last week.

Kyiv alleges war crimes such civilian deportations.

Kherson was under a 24-hour curfew on Friday, and photos online show the Russian flag no longer flies on the main administration building.

Kyiv fears such indicators are Russian disinformation to trap Ukrainian forces.

Kirill Stremousov, deputy leader of the Russian-installed administration in Kherson, said he hoped there would be no retreat but ‘we have to take some extremely painful decisions’.

Volodymyr Zelensky said the hardest fighting last week was around Bakhmut and Soledar, 310 miles northeast of Kherson in eastern Donetsk.

The Ukrainian president added, ‘We are holding our positions’.

He called Russia stubborn for sending ‘tens or hundreds of thousands more victims to the meat grinder’.

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