By Thomas Gibbons-Neff and Oleksandr Naselenko
Photographs by Emile Ducke
Reporting from Kherson, Ukraine
It was just after 1 p.m. when the first of three artillery shells shrieked past Maryna Korifadze’s bomb shelter in Kherson, landing nearby with a bone-rattling crump.
Her regular group of neighbors, some with children in tow, shuffled down the basement stairs and into the bunker. They passed around chocolate, coffee and tea. The younger crowd played table tennis in the next room.
“Sometimes it’s between 20 and 30 people a night here,” Ms. Korifadze said.
More than 20 months since Russia invaded, the war in Ukraine has been a test of endurance for the country’s civilians as they endure relentless Russian bombardments and missile strikes.
But the southern city of Kherson, captured by Russian forces early in the war and liberated by Ukrainian troops a year ago, holds a special place among Ukraine’s cities: It resides in a purgatory between liberation and occupation — free of Russian troops but in range of much of Moscow’s arsenal.
Kherson’s residents have endured week after week of random violence since Russian troops fled, hoping for deliverance but receiving little as the city and its environs remain a bloody flashpoint.
But there is some hope. A series of secretive assaults across the Dnipro River — which serves as Kherson’s southern and eastern boundary — helped Ukrainian forces secure a sliver of land on the Russian-held bank in recent weeks.
What comes next is unclear, but Kherson’s embattled residents believe that, if successful, the attacks could push Russian formations and artillery farther away from their city.
Ms. Korifadze, buoyed by the news, recently called one of her colleagues who lives on the Russian-occupied side of the river and assured her: “You will be liberated.”
That may or may not come true. For now, the Russian strikes in and around Kherson continue unabated.
The State of the War
Ukrainian Morale Is Tested: With the war deadlocked, the spirit that fueled Ukrainians early in the conflict against Russia is starting to fade, polling and interviews show.
A Striking Rebuke: The office of President Volodymyr Zelensky chastised Ukraine’s top military commander for publicly declaring the war at a stalemate. The censure signaled an emerging rift between the Ukrainian military and civilian leadership.
Strike on a Ceremony: Zelensky said that criminal proceedings had been initiated over an episode in which Russian missiles struck a medals ceremony, killing 19 Ukrainian soldiers.
Russia’s use of glide bombs — guided airdropped munitions capable of flying long distances — has increased by more than 2,000 percent in recent months, Oleksandr Tolokonnikov, a spokesman for the Kherson region’s military administration, said last week. Six weeks ago, there were one or two of these bombs a day across the region, he added, and now there are somewhere around 30 to 40.
Though his statistics could not be independently verified, Kherson’s residents have described a distinct change in the types and frequency of Russian ordnance being lobbed, dropped and fired at their city and surrounding towns. In recent days, Iskander ballistic missiles have also landed in Kherson, a violent breach of the normal rhythm of artillery.
For the full article with several images, please click here or click on the link below for a copy of the pdf file:
Emile Ducke contributed reporting from Kherson, and Marc Santora from Kyiv, Ukraine.
Thomas Gibbons-Neff is a Ukraine correspondent and a former Marine infantryman. More about Thomas Gibbons-Neff
A version of this article appears in print on Nov. 7, 2023, Section A, Page 4 of the New York edition with the headline: Free From Russian Rule, Not From Its Endless Shelling. Order Reprints |
A man walking by a crater left by an air bomb that struck Kherson, Ukraine, last month. Residents have endured week after week of random violence since Russian troops fled.
Comentários