https://tass.com/world/1416781

Kiev almost out of control of local administrations — Russian Defense Ministry

MOSCOW, March 4. /TASS/. Kiev has almost lost control of regional and district administrations across the country, the chief of Russia’s national defense command center, Mikhail Mizintsev, has said.

"The regime in Kiev has practically lost the ability to govern regional and district authorities," Mizintsev said.

He stressed that at the moment the civilian authorities in Ukrainian cities and communities were unable to take care of the civilian population or address social and utilities issues.

"Most cities and communities are in the hands of rampaging nationalist battalions, a so-called territorial defense. In fact, they are neo-Nazis, mercenaries, terrorists and bandits, some of them foreign," he added.

Mizintsev said that on Thursday he managed to contact some executives at the Ukrainian presidential office, who, for their part, shared the contact information of an official in Kharkov, reportedly responsible for assistance in creating a humanitarian corridor.

"When we managed to put through a phone call to that official, we heard the following reply. Let me quote him word for word: ‘I am not holding them. They are free to do where they want’," Mizintsev said.

The Russian side stressed that any humanitarian corridor would be long and stressed the need for providing motor transport for bringing evacuees to the agreed sites where Russia kept busses, hot meals and medical services ready.

"That official’s comment was brief and clear comment: ‘I’m not in the mood of committing suicide. The moment I begin gathering people and sending them towards Russia, I will be the first to be killed by the territorial defense battalions, to be more precise, the nationalist battalions, in other words, the Nazis’," Mizintsev said, adding that in fact Ukrainian officials were scared to death.