Kherson Breathes After Years of Strikes, but Residents Fear the Ceasefire's End

For the first two days in years, Kherson has been quiet. Videos posted online show people walking streets strung with anti-drone netting and gathering in the city's squares, doing things that normally mean watching the sky and listening for incoming drones. "Ever since the ceasefire was announced, there's been total silence," Olga, 42, said by phone from the city. She is raising two children. "It's as if everything has finally come to an end."

The lull is a US-brokered temporary ceasefire, the product of efforts by First Lady Melania Trump to secure safe passage out of Oleshky, a Russian-occupied city across the Dnipro river from Kherson. Russian forces have spent several days clearing mines from the road ahead of a planned civilian evacuation on Friday. Some American journalists are to be invited to witness what is being billed as a humanitarian operation. The pause is due to end on Sunday. Ukraine's human rights ombudsman, Dmytro Lubinets, said that since Tuesday Kherson has "literally come back to life," with people walking out in the autumn sun. No violations have been reported by either side in that time.

Residents describe the change in small, concrete terms. Dima said earlier ceasefires were generally not respected, and that people hardly believe the shelling has stopped. They are going to shops and drinking coffee, he said. A woman named Yulia wrote on social media about a trip to the supermarket from which she came home "whole and calm," not scared and sweating with a lump in her throat as usual. Olga drove to another town and took a bus to another district to visit her grandmother with her son. The shops and cafes were full, and there was even a small traffic jam.

The quiet has also opened the so-called red zone, the part of Kherson so exposed to drones and artillery that it has become unlivable. Dozens of people have gone back for their belongings. Dima described girls, boys, parents and grandmothers walking its streets with suitcases and bags. Denisa Bohackova, a Czech volunteer who lives in Kherson, said some are filming places where nobody has dared go for years, and where being present has meant, and will mean again, almost certain death. Some found buildings reduced to charred shells, others found homes looted. The scale of destruction, Bohackova said, is "breathtaking."

Some returned for reasons beyond property. Angela Dobrovolska's husband, Serhiy, was killed two years ago by a grenade dropped from a piloted Russian drone, the kind of "human safari" attack for which Kherson has become infamous. On Thursday she travelled from Kyiv to Kherson to visit his grave for the first time in months. "I'll be going to the cemetery to my husband," she said.

The city's population has fallen from over 250,000 to about 65,000 since Russia's full-scale invasion, which enters its sixth year in February. Civilian life never stopped, Bohackova said, but it went on under battlefield conditions, with schools, theatres, kindergartens and hospitals moved underground. "An ordinary civilian from Kherson has experienced more of this war than many soldiers," she said. Olga listed regular blackouts, mines dropped by drones and hidden under fallen leaves, ricocheting drone fragments, and a city that typically shuts by afternoon.

There is also suspicion about what the pause is being used for. An anonymous local government source told the BBC that Russia is using the lull to strengthen positions, bring in supplies, weapons, ammunition and drones, and redeploy forces. Petro Andriushchenko, director of Ukraine's Center for Studying the Occupation, said Kherson locals told him they saw a military build-up around Radensk, about 20km (12 miles) from Oleshky. Oleshky's residents will be saved, he said, but the enemy is being given a chance to exploit the ceasefire, and afterwards the situation may be worse because Russian units will be stronger.

Residents are clear-eyed about this. "The concern is that, starting Monday, things could turn truly chaotic," Olga said. Dima, preparing to visit his flat in the red zone for the first time in months with his wife, said they know the strikes will resume and increase. "These few days showed us how it could be if it all finally ended." The evacuation of Oleshky, due to finish by Sunday, sets the clock for what comes next.