Russian troops shelled Kherson and 30 settlements in the Kherson region 258 times in the past week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on November 28 in his evening address after calling on Ukrainians to be prepared to endure more electricity shortages amid dropping temperatures.
Russian forces retreated from the west bank of the Dnieper River earlier this month but have been shelling towns, villages, and the city of Kherson, from their new locations on the opposite bank.
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The Ukrainian government last week called on residents of Kherson to evacuate the city for the winter to avoid the bombardments, which Zelenskiy said damaged a pumping station supplying water to Mykolayiv, a city northwest of Kherson.
"This is the true essence of those random 'comrades' who took over Russia," Zelenskiy said.
"They are capable of nothing but destruction," he added. "This is all they leave behind. And what they are doing now against Ukraine is their attempt to take revenge...for the fact that Ukrainians have repeatedly defended themselves from them."
He said Ukraine will never be a place for destruction and will never accept orders from these "comrades" from Moscow. He again pledged to do "everything to restore every object, every house, every enterprise destroyed by the occupiers."
The British Ministry of Defense said earlier in its daily intelligence update on November 28 that Kherson continues to suffer daily bombardment by Russian artillery.
"The city is vulnerable because it remains in range of most of Russia’s artillery systems, now firing from the east bank of the Dnieper River, from the rear of newly consolidated defensive lines," British intelligence said.
Zelenskiy said earlier that Russia was "planning new strikes" on the country's power grid. As long as they have missiles, Russian forces "unfortunately, will not calm down," he said.
The head of the joint coordination press center of the Defense Forces of Southern Ukraine, Natalya Humenyuk, said a Russian warship capable of firing cruise missiles had recently deployed to the Black Sea with Kalibr-type missiles on board.
"This indicates that preparations were under way," Humenyuk said. "It's quite likely that the beginning of the week will be marked by such an attack."
Zelenskiy also reflected on a visit on November 28 from the foreign ministers of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, Norway, and Iceland. He said he spoke with them about Ukraine's needs for protection and reconstruction and told them their support and solidarity is very important right now.
"We have agreements on further cooperation in the defense and energy spheres as well as in the reconstruction projects of our state and in the sanctions sphere," Zelenskiy said.
A joint statement issued by the foreign ministers after their meeting condemned Russia’s “aggressive war” against Ukraine, which they said had caused enormous suffering in Ukraine, undermined stability in Europe, and attacked the rules-based international order.
“We are in complete solidarity with Ukraine. We will never recognize the illegal attempt to annex the territories of Ukraine, including Crimea,” the joint statement said. “Ukraine has an inalienable right to self-defense to ensure its independence and sovereignty and restore its territorial integrity within internationally recognized borders. Russia must stop its aggression and withdraw its troops from the entire territory of Ukraine.”
Ukrainian officials said earlier on November 28 that Russian forces continued to shell civilian areas across the country, hitting a dozen settlements in Donetsk, including the main targets of Bakhmut and Avdiyivka, and several villages in the Nikopol district of the central Dnipropetrovsk region.
The General Staff accused Russian troops of shelling civilian areas and then attempting to shift responsibility to Kyiv's military.
On the battlefield in the east, Ukrainian forces fought pitched battles, repelling 10 Russian attacks in the Donetsk region, Ukraine's General Staff of the Armed Forces said on November 28.
Russian forces had launched several failed attacks on the town of Soledar, near Bakhmut, and had taken heavy losses in a separate push toward Avdiyivka, Ukrainian military analyst Oleh Zhdanov told Reuters.
The claim could not be independently verified.