'We came back from hell', say Ukrainians after years in Russia-occupied frontline city

Hundreds of residents evacuated from the Russian-occupied frontline city of Oleshky arrived in the Ukrainian region of Chernihiv on Saturday, describing years of hardship under Russian control. Among them was Olha, who described life in the city over the past few years with a single word: "horror". Her husband Viacheslav, disembarking alongside her from a coach with their family and dog, said: "We came back from hell." Oleshky was seized by Russia in the first days of its full-scale invasion in February 2022. The city is trapped on one side by the Dnipro River and on the other by Russian forces. Olha and Viacheslav had lived there with their son and daughter, both in their 30s, and feared that trying to escape could be even more dangerous than staying, because routes were mined and exposed to drone attack. As supplies dwindled, the couple said they crossed through minefields earlier this month in an attempt to find food. "People were stepping on mines, dying and being maimed, all just to survive," Olha told the BBC. Those too afraid to go out resorted to cooking garden weeds. Up to 6,000 people, including 200 children, were believed to still be living in Oleshky and its surrounding areas, with 1,700 in the city itself. The opportunity to leave came this week when a humanitarian ceasefire, brokered by US First Lady Melania Trump, took effect in the Kherson region, bringing the first days of peace to the area in four years. Residents were given a four-hour window on Friday to leave, with a convoy of 25 buses brought in for up to 750 evacuees, along with ambulances for people with limited mobility. After travelling through Russian-occupied territory to southern Russia and then flying to Belarus, evacuees arrived by bus at a military facility in Chernihiv on Saturday. On the tarmac, some elderly residents were so weak they had to be carried on stretchers, while others experienced emotional reunions with loved ones they had not seen for years. One evacuee, Mykhailo Palii, was greeted by his daughters Dasha and Anya, who had believed they might never see him again and sprinted across the tarmac screaming and crying. He described a glimpse of life in the city, saying a hole had been blown into his bathroom and that there had been drone attacks and missile strikes, details he said he had kept from his family so they would not worry. Another couple, Tetiana and Volodymyr, who arrived carrying a cat, said their home was burned down three years ago and they had since been living in the abandoned house of a neighbour. Tetiana said leaving had been an easy decision because they had no relatives remaining in the city. Those who escaped continue to worry about the residents left behind. "There are still a lot of people left there, living under those conditions," Olha said. The evacuees now face the challenge of rebuilding their lives. Palii said he would look for work, saying there was no job he could not handle, while Olha said her family had no relatives elsewhere in Ukraine and would stay with acquaintances while they got back on their feet. "If we managed to survive in hell, we'll survive here too," she said.