MELITOPOL, September 29. /TASS/. Russian forces are delivering preemptive strikes on targets on the western bank of the Dnieper in the Kherson Region so as to complicate the Ukrainian armed forces’ preparations for crossing the river and advancing, the chairman of the We Are Together with Russia movement, Vladimir Rogov, told TASS.

Rogov commented on reports that the Ukrainian military was plotting an offensive in the Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions in early October.

"Regarding the Kherson area, it is exactly for this purpose that now our missile strikes and aircraft are being engaged," he said, adding that the strikes are continually targeting Berislav and Kazatsky on the other bank, opposite Novaya Kakhovka.

"This is the work aimed at preventing the enemy’s attempts to mount an offensive, to cross the Dnieper and to redeploy their reinforcements, along with other actions," Rogov said.

A source close to the authorities told TASS earlier that Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky had agreed with his British and American handlers to mount an offensive in the Kherson and Zaporozhye areas in early October. A major grouping of Ukrainian marines has been accumulated in the Nikolayev region in order to cross the Dnieper River, and simultaneously, according to the source, it is planned to try to seize the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant.