Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on December 8 that he believes "mine terror" will be one of the charges against Russia when it is held to account for its invasion of Ukraine.
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"I am sure this will be among the charges against Russia for aggression,” Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address after posthumously presenting state awards to four policemen who died on December 7 in the Kherson region when Russian mines blew up.
Zelenskiy signed decrees awarding the title of Hero of Ukraine to police Colonel Mykhaylo Kuratchenko and the Order of Courage to police captains Ihor Melnyk and Serhiy Nenada, and Corporal Vadym Perizhko.
“They did everything for the safety of Ukrainians,” he said.
They were killed when they “fell into a mine trap" after returning from collecting weapons and ammunition left in the Kherson region by Russians, he said in his video message.
Zelenskiy said the use of mines is even more cruel than the use of missiles because mines cannot be shot out of the air. He said Russian mines are a legacy of terror that Ukraine will have to contend with for years.
The Ukrainian Interior Ministry said last month that approximately one-third of the territory of Ukraine remains potentially dangerous due to explosive objects.
At the end of October, Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskiy said that, in the territories recently liberated from the Russian Army, mining is twice as dense as in the previously deoccupied part of the Kyiv region or Chernihiv region.
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Ukrainian Crews Work To Clear Liberated Areas Of Donetsk Of Russian Explosives
The head of the joint coordination press center of the Defense Forces of Southern Ukraine, Natalya Humenyuk, said Russian troops who retreated from the Kherson region used "insidious" methods of mining large areas.
The mines have slowed the work of Ukrainian specialists restoring power knocked out by Russian attacks on the country's infrastructure.