Resistance fighters step up efforts, ahead of their hoped-for liberation by Ukraine’s military, says Yellow Ribbon leader

Yellow Ribbon’s efforts have attracted the attention of Volodymyr Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, who has used the group to disseminate his messages across the occupied territories

Ukrainian partisans in the Russian-occupied city of Melitopol are outing collaborators and defacing rouble banknotes as they build momentum ahead of an expected counter-offensive by Kyiv, an underground resistance leader has told The Telegraph. “News of the future counter-offensive, and the potential that Melitopol and the Zaporizhzhia region will be liberated soon has really encouraged a lot of people to do something patriotic,” said Ivan (not his real name).“Like with Kherson, we have seen a big boom in pro-Ukrainians feeling more and more confident to join a resistance movement,” the IT expert added. With only Russian officers remaining in the city, he said resistance fighters had stepped up efforts ahead of their hoped-for liberation by Ukraine’s military. “For now, it’s completely only officer staff,” Ivan said, in a hint that Russia believes Melitopol is a genuine target for Kyiv. 

“The Russians are using saunas to hang out and take a shower,” he added. “We know that Ukrainians are taking photos of this and sending them to our armed forces.”

Meanwhile, Russia has dispatched separatist fighters, Chechens and conscripts, often used by Moscow as cannon fodder, to the southern frontline in anticipation of the attack, according to Ivan. 

Melitopol, which had a pre-war population of about 150,000, was captured by Russian forces less than a week after Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine.

The city has acted as a key logistics hub - with Moscow’s tanks and infantry vehicles often spotted passing through - for the Kremlin in southern Ukraine, and it is part of the land bridge linking Russia to the occupied Crimea peninsula. 

Melitopol’s importance to Russia’s grip on Crimea, which it annexed illegally in 2014, has created a growing expectation that Melitopol could be a leading target for Ukraine’s spring counter-offensive.

When Russian troops entered his city last February, Ivan started by organising peaceful protests against the occupation, chanting slogans such as “Russians go home” and “Melitopol is Ukraine”.

Displays of resistance

With many of his comrades arrested, and probably sent to internment camps deep in Russian-held territory, his Yellow Ribbon non-violent resistance movement has gone deeper underground.

In recent months, its activists have plastered pictures of pro-Kremlin collaborators across the streets and decorated Russian rouble banknotes with pro-Ukrainian slogans to undermine their occupiers.

Information they have gathered has been used by local partisan movements and Ukraine’s armed forces to target Russian positions, such as military bases and logistics hubs.