A man sends a photo of "Oleshky borsch," a vegetable soup he has made from leftovers. To make the soup more filling, he says he has added millet and two eggs.
"Today, we have a delicacy in our borsch. My mother traded 2.5 kilograms (5.5 pounds) of sugar for 10 eggs," he tells the recipient of the photo, Tetiana Hasanenko, the head of the Oleshky City Military Administration, which is based in territory controlled by Kyiv. "There's no cabbage in it, but there is asparagus," he adds.
Hasanenko says she's used to getting such messages. "I receive reports like this every day," Hasanenko told DW. "People want to be given some kind of hope, but there is no hope." She said food was last delivered to the town at the end of May. "The situation is critical," she said, warning that "you can't just call this starvation — it's a famine."
Oleshky is located in Ukraine's southern Kherson region on the left bank of the Dnipro River. The city has been occupied since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.
In June 2023, the town was almost completely flooded after a blast at the Kakhovka Power Plant and the breach of the Kakhovka Dam.
Hasanenko said the situation worsened last winter. She said there were about 6,000 people left in the area, including 180 children. They have already become accustomed to living without electricity and gas and have to fetch water from wells. Now, they have to prepare for another harsh winter.
'One kilo of zucchini for 1,000 rubles'
"To be honest, I haven't eaten anything yet," resident Halyna (whose name has been changed for security reasons) told DW by phone at around lunchtime. "My best option for today is a flatbread made of water and flour, as there's still some left. I spread apple sauce on it and make myself some tea without sugar. That's about it."
People only go out between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m., she explained, adding that they tended to gather in the market square to hear the latest news and would trade or sell food from their supplies or gardens.
"Today, there were a few zucchinis for 1,000 rubles (€10 or $11.4) per kilo," she said, adding that someone had sold a large sack of flour for 200,000 rubles. She speculated that he was probably going to try to leave Oleshky, which is why the price was so high.
Minibuses used to run from Oleshky to Skadovsk about an hour south and then to Crimea or Russia. They also transported food to Oleshky for sale. After they were attacked by drones, two ambulances were deployed instead. "But for the past month and a half, none of the ambulances have been running, because one of the drivers was killed on a trip," Halyna reported.
She explained that people are now stocking up on food in the village of Radensk, located 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) to the south. People walk there or ride their bikes.
Anyone who wants to be evacuated must reach the village of Tarasivka, which is another 20 kilometers away. From there, you can get to Skadovsk by minibus or by hitchhiking. However, the route is heavily mined. "You set out and could die along the way," Halyna said, adding that two women who were trying to get food died that way.
According to Halyna, scores of people in Oleshky have been injured by mines and explosive devices. But they can't count on medical help.
"If your leg is blown off, you're as good as dead. There's a surgeon at the hospital, but no anesthesiologist and no medicine," she said. Conditions are also deteriorating for inpatients. "Last winter, they still got some soup and two pieces of baked dough," she said, adding that now there's one and a half spoonfuls of semolina porridge cooked in water and cold tea.
Moreover, evacuating from Oleshky is difficult not only because of the danger of landmines. Many residents have neither a Russian nor a Ukrainian passport. In addition, people lack cash.
Moscow lacks evacuation willingness
"There is only one solution: A 'green corridor' must be established and the people evacuated. The occupying authorities must move the people deeper into the temporarily occupied territory," says Tetiana Hasanenko of the Ukrainian military administration.
Talks about an evacuation from Oleshky have been ongoing since last spring. At that time, at the initiative of the Ukrainian parliamentary human rights commissioner, Dmytro Lubinets, city officials compiled a list of residents who wish to leave the municipality of Oleshky.
"358 people need to be evacuated urgently," he wrote on social media. "These are only the ones we've heard about," he emphasized, noting that the town of Oleshky currently has more than 6,000 residents. "These people must be rescued because the town has become a death trap," the ombudsman said.
According to him, preliminary agreements had been reached between Kyiv and Moscow. The Ukrainian military was to ensure a ceasefire, and the International Committee of the Red Cross was to assist with the evacuation. But Russia "has not reaffirmed its willingness" to carry out the evacuation "for quite some time," Lubinets said.
Meanwhile, the residents of Oleshky are desperate, says Tetiana Hasanenko. "They had hoped that the evacuation would begin at any moment. But what now? I can't give them any hope at all," she laments.
