Russia occupied the southern city of Kherson and parts of the surrounding area in the first week of the invasion. RIA Novosti, Russia’s state-run news agency, reported on Thursday that a Russian-appointed “official” had said that the Kherson region would start converting rubles into its payments from next month before rejecting the Ukrainian currency in four months. Kirill Stremousov, deputy head of the Russian-controlled “political-military administration” in Kherson, also made it clear that Kherson would leave Ukraine permanently. “The reintegration of the Kherson region back into a Nazi Ukraine is ruled out,” he said, citing anonymous reports of alleged discrimination against Russian-speakers. “It’s impossible.”
