The occupiers took away the equipment, stocks of spirits and collectible cognac from the Novaya Kakhovka factory – the chairman

Russian occupiers dismantled and removed two new cognac bottling lines, also ransacked the alcohol aging shop and all finished products that were in warehouses, claims the mayor of Novaya Kakhovka

The Russian military looted the “House of vintage cognacs” Tavria” in Nova Kakhovka, which is still under occupation, said the chairman Oleksandr Kovalenko.

According to him, in the summer, the Russian military set up its hospital in a preventive ward on the territory of the enterprise. Later, the Russian occupiers dismantled and removed two new cognac bottling lines, also ransacked the alcohol aging shop and all the finished products that were in the warehouses, Kovalenko claims.

“The company had and still has a unique alcohol aging shop. The pride of both the management of the enterprise and the city itself, because there were spirits there that were aged for dozens of years – 30, 35 years each. Unique types of cognacs are collectible. Unfortunately, this alcohol material, these stocks, as far as I know, were taken somewhere in the Crimea or the Krasnodar Territory.

Practically all the products that were ready in the warehouses have been exported,” the chairman said.

He says that the Russian military still lives on the premises of this enterprise from time to time.

In view of the hostilities and Russia’s long-term occupation of the southern part of Ukraine, the editors cannot obtain official confirmation of some of the statements made or independently verify them.

In mid-November, the “administration of Novaya Kakhovka” established by Russia announced that its employees were forced to leave the city and relocate to safer areas of the Kherson region.

On December 17, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reported that Russian forces are redeploying individual units and withdrawing part of their troops from Kakhovka and Novaya Kakhovka of the Kherson region to the area of ​​the settlement of Nizhny Sirogozy.

Nova Kakhovka is a city in the Kherson region on the left bank of the Dnieper.

The Russian military took away collectible wines from the Trubetskyi winery in the Kherson region. The general manager of the winery, Andriy Strelets, told about it. From the first hours of the full-scale invasion of Russia, Prince Trubetsky’s chateau was under the control of the Russian occupation forces. Neither employees nor management had access to it for nine months. Russian occupiers lived on the territory of the winery and looted the entire collection of wines, the journalists write.

Today, the village of Vesele, where the production is located, is deoccupied. The shooter reported that the building of the historic chateau and houses on the territory were damaged. Equipment and furniture of a restaurant, hotel, office, and store were also stolen. The Russian occupation forces completely looted the wine collection, which had been collected at the winery for several generations, the manager claims. According to him, seven bottles of wine were stolen, which had been stored since the beginning of the 20th century, since the time of Prince Trubetsky. The wines that were on aging have also disappeared, he said.

“They are shelling the vineyards”

In a comment to Novynam Priazovya, Strelets noted that the situation in the chateau is “difficult” and spoke in more detail about the extent of the destruction on the territory of the winery.

“The entrance group of our chateau was completely shelled, as was the restaurant. Windows and doors were broken, the hotel was destroyed, you could say it was looted. We had 10 rooms there. We set up summer campsites the year before last, they were destroyed. Also, we have destroyed our unique collection, we have been collecting wines since 1958,” the manager of the winery said.

Despite the fact that the right-bank Kherson Region has already been liberated, the workers cannot yet enter the territory of the chateau.

“The Russians are firing from the left bank, the vineyards are also firing. We know that they are there, but we can’t figure out what happened to them, in what condition, yet,” said Strelets.

It is destroyed, it is simply gone.

He claims that there is no finished product left in the winery – it was either drunk or looted.

“We had a warehouse near Kyiv in Gostomel, it burned down completely. We lost finished products – that’s more than 72,000 bottles without a collection. It is destroyed, it is simply gone. The collection is priceless, it’s millions of dollars,” assured the manager of the chateau.

In view of the hostilities and Russia’s long-term occupation of the southern part of Ukraine, the editors cannot obtain official confirmation of some of the statements made or independently verify them.

“Cognac bottling lines were removed”

The chairman of Nova Kakhovka, Volodymyr Kovalenko, said that, in addition to the Knyaz Trubetskoho PJSC winery, there is also the “Tavria House of Vintage Cognacs” on the territory of the city community. This enterprise is located on the left bank.

“The situation is worse there. The territory is occupied and the worst or most unpleasant thing is that this enterprise has become a location of enemies from time to time for many months,” the official said.

According to his information, in the summer, the Russian military set up its hospital in a preventive ward on the territory of the enterprise.

“Regarding the enterprise itself, no one entered there for three months, there was security there. And in June, the occupiers entered there, there is a certain percentage of communal property, which belongs to the city council. As the deputy director at the time said, they said that it was municipal property, and even if a bottle of cognac was lost, they would be shot. And somewhere in the autumn period – September – the robbery began,” Kovalenko noted.

He said that the Russian occupiers dismantled and removed two new cognac bottling lines, also ransacked the alcohol aging shop and all the finished products that were in the warehouses.

“The company had and still has a unique alcohol aging shop. The pride of both the management of the enterprise and the city itself, because there were spirits there that were kept for dozens of years, 30, 35 years. Unique types of cognacs are collectible. Unfortunately, this alcohol material, these stocks, as far as I know, were taken somewhere in the Crimea or the Krasnodar Territory. Practically all the products that were ready in the warehouses have been exported,” the chairman said.

The chairman of Nova Kakhovka says that the Russian military still lives on the territory of this enterprise from time to time.

“20 days ago, the enemy lived on the territory of the cafeteria, which was at this enterprise. The armed forces of Ukraine, understanding the situation and according to intelligence information, clearly had an approach there, the enemy had serious losses there,” the official said.

Losses amounting to “hundreds of millions of hryvnias”

To date, it is difficult to calculate the damage suffered by the Tavria House of Vintage Cognacs, as it is still under occupation. However, these losses are “quite serious”, Kovalenko believes.

“These are tens and hundreds of millions of hryvnias of losses incurred by this company. Quite serious damage. It will not be easy to restore all this. What does it mean for alcohol to stay in warehouses for 25-30-35 years, undergo a smoking process, starting with planting vineyards and up to 35 years. It cannot be measured simply in money, because it is a loss of such a technological nature. And this is much more difficult, because a considerable period is required,” Kovalenko noted.

Sevastyan Ksyondz, a member of the Supervisory Board of the Tavriya House of Vintage Cognacs company, said that, according to his information, the Russian occupying forces recognized the company’s production facilities, raw materials and finished products as “ownerless” and “handed them over to the management of a 3rd person from Crimea, who apparently connected with an influential person from the Krasnodar Territory.”

According to him, “for the past two months, the plant’s property and products have been stolen, almost every day they are taken away by trucks in an unknown direction.” In addition, according to the entrepreneur, since February 24 this year, a large part of real estate and vineyards have been destroyed as a result of hostilities.

The impact of the war on the market

Ivan Plachkov, the owner of the “Kolonist” winery located in the Odesa region, noted that the wine industry of Ukraine has suffered significant losses due to hostilities and Russia’s occupation of part of the southern region.

“The situation is very difficult, critical. Those wineries and vineyards that were under occupation are in the Kherson region, in Zaporizhzhia, part of the Mykolaiv region, they were all destroyed, the vineyards were gutted. It is clear that the amount of products has decreased on the Ukrainian market and everything will have to be restored, new vineyards planted, wineries built, and new equipment bought.

A lot of modern equipment from Ukrainian wineries was stolen and exported to Russia,” said Plachkov.

He told how the full-scale war affected the activities of his company.

“In the spring, we could not cultivate the vineyards, there was no diesel fuel, there were no components for wine production. In Gostomel, a factory that produced bottles was destroyed by a rocket, we were left without bottles. That is, all logistics were destroyed.

Therefore, it was very difficult for us to preserve the vineyards. We harvested the harvest, people worked without wages, because there was no sale. And now it is very difficult to sell wine,” the winemaker assured.

The owner of the Colonist enterprise says that the financial situation is “very difficult”, but the winery is trying to operate.

“We are shipping wine little by little. We have contracts, for example with Canada, we sent a small amount. This helps us a lot, because the Ukrainian market is resting. The demand for quality Ukrainian wine is increasing slightly and the patriotic mood of Ukrainians is being activated. They increasingly choose Ukrainian,” Plachkov noted.

The entrepreneur added that now the winery is supported by some Ukrainian companies in this industry as well as international partners.

“We bought bottles in Moldova, everything contributed to this, according to the contracts, we quickly organized delivery. Now we are supported by our French friends. Almost free of charge, they will supply us with new French barriques (barrels) for us to age the wine, especially the 2022 wine. As they said, we will send you the barrels so that you can make the “wine of victory,” the owner of the winery noted.

On October 5, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed laws on the “incorporation into Russia” of four partially occupied regions of Ukraine – Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson. Earlier, he signed a decree recognizing the “independence” of these regions based on the so-called referendums held there under Moscow’s control.

Ukraine and the West condemned such illegal actions of the Kremlin. Kyiv, Washington, as well as Britain and Canada announced new sanctions against the Russian Federation.

Ukraine declares that it will fight by armed means to return the occupied territories under its control.

On November 11, the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine announced that Kherson was returning to the control of the Ukrainian army. The Russian military retreated from the right bank of the Dnieper, where, in particular, the regional center is located. After the retreat, the Russian invaders began regularly shelling the right bank of the Kherson region.

After the deoccupation, the police recorded 7 torture chambers and 8 places of imprisonment in the liberated territory of the Kherson region.

This was told by the acting Andriy Kovany, Head of the Communications Department of the Main Directorate of the National Police in the Kherson region.

“Currently, 7 torture chambers and 8 places of deprivation of liberty have been recorded in the de-occupied territories: 3 torture chambers and 1 place of deprivation of liberty are directly in Kherson, another 4 torture chambers and 7 places of deprivation of liberty are in the Berislavsky district,” Kovany said.

According to him, these are not all torture chambers, but only those recorded by the police, because investigative teams include not only police representatives, that is why other structures also record the places where torture chambers were located.

In the regional center, the largest place of torture of citizens was in the temporary detention center, there are more than 300 confirmed cases of detention of people here, their identities have already been established, and they are testifying. But, as Kovany emphasized, this number is growing every day: “The exact number of people who have passed through this torture chamber has not yet been determined.”

He noted that in total, more than 8,000 criminal proceedings have been initiated on the facts of war crimes in the territory of Kherson region since the beginning of hostilities.

In the village of Pravdyne, Kherson district, the burial of several people with traces of torture and gunshot wounds was discovered. The discovered corpses were exhumed and sent for forensic examination.

Three torture chambers and one place of imprisonment were recorded in Kherson

The national police of the Kherson region discovered seven more torture chambers and eight places of imprisonment. This was announced by Andrii Kovany, acting head of the communication department of the State Government of Ukraine in the Kherson region.

“Currently, seven torture chambers and eight places of imprisonment have been recorded in the de-occupied territories. Three torture chambers and one place of imprisonment are directly in Kherson itself. Another four torture chambers and seven places of imprisonment are in Beryslav district. But that’s not all. These are only those that I can talk about as a police officer,” Kovany said.

It is noted that more than 300 people were detained in just one torture chamber in Kherson. These data may not be final, because the number is growing.

The occupiers are shelling Kherson with prohibited shells.

In addition, Russian terrorists are deliberately shelling settlements on the left bank of the Kherson region in order to force the local population to evacuate.

Serhii Khlan, deputy of the Kherson Regional Council, reported that the Russian army is conducting a forced “evacuation” of citizens in the temporarily occupied Kakhovka and Nova Kakhovka.

Khlan noted that the Russian army is not shelling the right bank of the Kherson region, which was deoccupied in November, but also the left bank of the region, which is still under occupation.

“Such observations are made in Oleshki, Goliya Prystan, and Kakhovka… In other words, they do it on purpose to force people to leave,” he said.

The Kherson deputy added that the occupiers announced a forced “evacuation” on the left bank of the region.

“And with such shelling, they are provoking,” Serhii Khlan explained.

He noted that today the occupiers officially announced that on December 22-23 they will “evacuate” local residents from Kakhovka and Novaya Kakhovka to Henichesk by bus.

“And these shellings, which they are trying to do on the left bank of the Dnieper, are a provocation for people to leave their homes en masse,” he emphasized.

According to the Ukrainian General Staff, the Russians have begun the redeployment of individual units and are withdrawing part of their troops from Kakhovka and Novaya Kakhovka. Among local residents, the occupiers are spreading information that Kakhovka will be abandoned by Russian troops by the end of this year.

Occupiers-collaborators stole the brand, image of the premises and began luring Kherson teenagers to study at the so-called falsified maritime academy. They partially succeeded in this.

Oleksandr Shumey writes about this: “But imagine the cynicism in the attitude towards children: the locals, for whom the uniform and the sailor suit are a matter of pride, were forbidden to wear the uniform in public. Another manipulation took place with the organization of rest during forced vacations.

There are separate reports that most of the minor cadets of the pseudo-academy were organized and taken to Crimea and are still being held. It seems that this was a purposeful action.

I understand, for some families, it was a conscious choice. But the majority are hostages of their own frivolity and manipulation.

If you know about the facts of deportation and illegal detention of Kherson teenagers who were related to maritime educational institutions, please send the information to novikova@journlab.online

Confidentiality is guaranteed”…