‘We have land to liberate, and every shell costs money’: Governor of Russia’s Kursk region says state won’t fully compensate residents for destroyed property

Meduza.io

Alexander Khinshtein, the recently appointed acting governor of Russia’s Kursk region, said at a recent meeting with residents of the war-torn Sudzhansky district that the government will not cover all the costs of rebuilding facilities destroyed in the fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces. Footage of the meeting was published by the outlets Sirena and RusNews.

The state will not cover 100 percent of the costs. We won’t be compensating you for a destroyed bathhouse, not because we don’t want to, but because we’ll have to… Just imagine how many villages settlements, and roads have been destroyed: schools, hospitals, clinics, stores, pharmacies, your homes. How are we going to rebuild all of this? And the special military operation is still ongoing and is highly technical — we have land to liberate, and every shell, I’m sorry to say, costs money.

Khinshtein also said in the meeting that the Russian federal budget does not have sufficient funds to restore everything that’s been destroyed. He noted that the government has other social obligations, such as pension payments, road construction, and maintenance.

Who is Khinshtein?

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