Ukraine Dam Disaster: UN Distributes 12,000 Bottles Of Water To Children

The United Nations and partners have distributed nearly 12,000 bottles of water to children on the move in Kherson and in the city of Mykolaiv, following the destruction of the Kakhovka dam in southern Ukraine.

UN Spokesperson, Mr. Stéphane Dujarric, said this at a news conference on Wednesday at the UN headquarters in New York. Dujarric said more than 1,700 kits with essential supplies were also distributed for children on the move, and 10,000 purification tablets to five municipalities in Kherson and in the city of Mykolaiv.

He said “We also distributed ready-to-eat food for about 400 people within hours of their evacuation, and today we are providing one month’s worth of food to 200 people in the Mykolaiv region. Humanitarian organisations are also supporting the authorities with the evacuations and are helping coordinate the accommodation of people arriving from Kherson into various transit centres.

The spokesperson also briefed on operational response from the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, representatives of five UN agencies and some NGOs that were in Kherson to assess the situation.

On Tuesday, June 6, around 1,500 people left their flooded homes. That is according to the International Organisation for Migration, and more people were evacuated Wednesday. Most of them are staying in Mykolaiv city, which is close to their homes.

According to him, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation warns that the destruction of the dam will likely impact food security, as thousands of hectares of agricultural land have now been flooded, destroying recently planted crops.

He told Security Council members on Tuesday that the destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant dam was possibly the most significant damage to civilian infrastructure since the start of the Russian invasion in February, 2022.