Ukraine rations power and warns of lethal winter, despite war gains

Russian attacks on the Ukrainian power grid forced nationwide power cuts Thursday, deepening the misery of a people facing winter without enough light or heat, while Ukraine’s president accused Moscow of planning to blow up a dam, which would cause catastrophic flooding and knock out more power supply.
The government ordered Ukrainians to minimize electricity use from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m., after 10 days of concerted missile and drone attacks on utilities that have left civilians struggling with rolling blackouts and scattered shortages of clean water. Ukrainian and United Nations officials have warned of a deadly humanitarian crisis for civilians in the coming cold months.
Speaking remotely video to European Union leaders, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Thursday that “we have information” that Russian forces had mined the Kakhovka hydroelectric dam on the Dnieper River. If the dam were destroyed, he said, towns would be inundated and “hundreds of thousands of people could be affected.”

In an overnight address, Zelenskyy, who has said that one-third of Ukraine’s power stations have been knocked out, pleaded with his people to forgo using high-energy devices and to be conscious of every bit of power consumption. The national electric utility, Ukrenergo, said Thursday that the grid had suffered more attacks in 10 days than in the previous 7 1/2 months of war.
Kyiv, the capital, replaced most of its electric trams with buses and told businesses to limit lighting on signs and screens, the mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said. On Thursday night, the city was noticeably darker than usual, with only a few streetlights to help pedestrians and motors find their way.
In the southern city of Kherson, Russian authorities said Thursday that they had evacuated 15,000 civilians and planned to relocate up to 60,000, in what some Ukrainian officials and Western analysts described as a sign that the Russian military may be preparing to abandon the city. The city lies on the Dnieper downstream from the Kakhovka dam, and could be flooded if the dam were damaged.
The Ukrainian military warned on Thursday that Russia is increasing its military presence in Belarus, north of Ukraine, raising the specter of a new offensive from that direction. When Russia invaded on Feb. 24, it sent forces southward from Belarus hoping to swiftly capture Kyiv, but the offensive failed and the Russians withdrew from that part of the country.