On February 24 last year, 2123 people lived in Oleksandrivka, on the outskirts of Kherson, during the Russian occupation only 16 remained.
Those who have stayed are almost all retirees, people who did not want to leave the houses where they lived. They only survived on what they had saved in the village and on canned food from the neighbours. One lady, the oldest of those who stayed, tells that Russian soldiers gave them some food from time to time.
It was taken to Stanislavski, a village seven kilometers away. There the picture is different: “There are people who supported the occupation authorities, helped the invaders, cooperated with them. There are certainly still people waiting for the occupiers to return,” Nataliya complains.
The invaders left Oleksandrivka on November 9. On the same day, Kherson fell. And a day later Ukrainian soldiers arrived. With missiles still falling on the village, the Russian positions are just over 10 kilometers in a straight line, on the other side of the Dnieper Gulf. But this is far from the only security threat: anti-tank and anti-personnel mines are everywhere.
“Unfortunately, a whole family has already died. It was outside the village, they were driving and an anti-tank mine exploded,” he reports. Just this week, a 31-year-old man stepped on a mine. “Thank God he’s still alive,” but he’s lost a leg.
We spoke to Nataliya at the Parish Town Hall. Outside, on Rua da Paz, is a bust of the poet Taras Shevchenko with multiple shots to the chest and a line of dozens of people. Some hold World Food Program (WFP) blue bags in their hands. Without being able to work the fields, formerly farming and now mining, there is little for them to do.
“We distribute humanitarian aid almost daily and we deliver bread twice a week. It’s a basic basket, by WFP standards.” The town hall is one of the few that has survived intact in the village. The pharmacy, on the other side of the muddy road, was less fortunate and burned down. But their reconstruction, like that of the houses, depends on voluntary organizations that “keep what’s left of them”.
Source: DN
