photo copyrightREUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko
Residents of Aleshki in the Kherson region (Ukrainian name - Oleshki), who decided to evacuate from the city that found itself in a situation of humanitarian disaster, returned to Ukraine across the land border with Belarus.
The evacuation, made possible as a result of a temporary ceasefire in the Aleshek area, took almost a day.
The residents of Aleshki, who chose Russia for evacuation, spent the night in Simferopol. It was assumed that they would reach Anapa, from where they would fly to the Moscow region; the reason for the change in plans was not reported.
Buses with residents of Aleshek (Ukrainian name - Oleshki) occupied by Russia since 2022 crossed the Belarusian-Ukrainian border and are on the territory of Ukraine, in the Chernihiv region, President Vladimir Zelensky said at about 15:00 Kyiv time.
The border crossing was confirmed by the Belarusian agency BelTA and the Ukrainian Ombudsman Dmitry Lubinets.
“The humanitarian mission has ended successfully! Ours are home! - he wrote.
According to him, the oldest passenger on the evacuation bus is 94 years old, the youngest is a little over a year old.
In photographs published by Ukrainian media, residents of Aleshki are met at the border by relatives with Ukrainian flags and posters.
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“We really wanted Ukraine to come to Oleshki, and not us coming here. It was very scary there... We returned from hell,” Olga, who had just gotten off the bus, told the BBC Ukrainian Service.
Shortly before this, trucks crossed the border, in which the dogs and cats of the residents of Aleshki were brought to the territory of Ukraine.
On Saturday morning, four military transport aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces landed at the airport in Belarusian Gomel, said the head of the Servant of the People faction in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, David Arakhamia. On board the planes were residents of the city of Aleshki, who decided to leave the city for the territory of Ukraine.
“The last, fourth plane landed in Gomel. In just a few hours, all Ukrainian citizens evacuated from Oleshki, together with the Ukrainian delegation, will be on the territory of Ukraine,” Arakhamia wrote on Saturday morning.
It is unknown how many people decided to travel from Aleshki to Ukraine. On Friday, speaking in the Verkhovna Rada, Prime Minister of Ukraine Sergei Koretsky spoke about 527 residents of the city, but later said that this was a mistake and the exact number would become known only after the residents of Aleshki crossed the Belarusian-Ukrainian border.
American NewsMax channel reporter Alex Salvi, accompanying those evacuating from Aleshki, said that 11 buses left with the Ukrainian delegation, and four with the Russian delegation. He was personally present when the buses were dispatched, a journalist in X reported. Neither Moscow nor Kyiv commented on this.
Photo copyright BelTA
A video published by the Belarusian state news agency BelTA shows that at least a dozen cats and dogs, pets of the residents of Aleshki, were delivered to Belarus on the same planes.
Pensioners Nikolai and Galina told Belarusian journalists that they took three dogs from Aleshki: two spaniels and a shepherd dog. “Our spaniel Volya was with us from the first days of the war,” Nikolai told BelTA. “Once while out for a walk he blew himself up on a tripwire. We tried to find him, but they didn’t let us in, because there was a risk of dying ourselves. Everything there was mined: people went 25 km to a neighboring town for food and did not return, they died. We were very worried about the dog, but by some miracle he returned home half a day later, completely wounded. There were eight wounds - they barely survived. Now he is coming with us."
"There's nowhere to go back"
Some evacuees told reporters that they could not imagine returning to Alyoshki.
“We were afraid for our lives. There (in Aleshki - BBC) it was impossible to even properly bury a person. I don’t want to bury someone in my garden,” city resident Olga told the BBC Ukrainian Service.
At the same time, according to her, many residents of Aleshki remained in the city.
“I am both happy and anxious at the same time. There are still people left there, for whom we also worry. They asked us: will you return to Ukraine? And it seems to me that there will be no place to return to. There is so much destruction there. There is nowhere to return,” Olga said.
“We lived without electricity for four years. For us, just the ability to see bright light is already something. Now we can’t even get used to this,” resident Aleshek Olga Ivanovna told a BelTA correspondent during a stop in Gomel. A granddaughter and two great-granddaughters are waiting for her in Ukraine. The woman has no hope of returning to Aleshki, where most of the houses were destroyed after months of shelling, BelTA writes.
The planes carrying residents of Aleshki flew to Gomel on Saturday morning from Anapa, where the evacuees were brought by bus through Armyansk in Russian-annexed Crimea. Anapa airport has been closed to passenger civil aviation since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
image copyrightRussian Defense Ministry/TASS
The evacuees were accompanied all the way from Aleshki by the Commissioner for Human Rights in Ukraine Dmitry Lubinets.
“For us, the humanitarian mission is still ongoing, it will end when Ukrainian citizens are already in Ukraine. Now we are actually at the penultimate stage. We are grateful for organizing the mission in the Republic of Belarus at a very high level,” BelTA quotes Lubinets.
From Gomel, residents of Aleshki were taken by bus to the Novaya Guta border checkpoint, through which they entered Ukraine.
The day before, Lubinets and the Russian Ombudsman Yana Lantratova flew from Gomel, where the Aleshkin humanitarian mission began, to Anapa on the same plane. This was the first time a Ukrainian official crossed the Russian border since the start of the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022.
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From Aleshki - to Simferopol
The second group of evacuees from Aleshki, the Russian one, was supposed to follow the first one out of the city to Anapa, from where, as expected, it was supposed to fly by military transport aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces to the Moscow region.
However, on Friday evening it became known that those who decided to evacuate from Aleshki to Russia were brought by bus to Simferopol, where they stayed overnight. The reason for the plan change or delay was not given.
How many people chose the option of evacuation to Russia was also not officially reported.
photo copyrightTASS
In Simferopol, those who arrived from Aleshki were placed in a temporary accommodation center. Doctors examined the evacuees.
Photo copyright, Sergei Malgavko/TASS
The humanitarian operation in the city of Aleshki in the occupied part of the Kherson region, which began on Friday, was initiated by the wife of the US President Melania Trump and Pope Leo XVI. According to Melania Trump, about 750 people agreed to leave Aleshki. Neither Russia nor Ukraine commented on these data or provided alternative estimates.
This was the first joint mission between Russia and Ukraine since the beginning of the war, led by the ombudsmen of the two countries.
To this end, the military of Ukraine and Russia agreed to cease fire in the Aleshek area from 03:00 local time (04:00 Moscow time) on October 27 until midnight on Sunday, November 1.
The regime of silence was observed by both sides, the ombudsmen noted on Friday, October 30.
For those who decided to stay in the constantly shelled city, “several tens of tons of humanitarian aid - food, hygiene products, fuel for generators” were delivered, Lantratova said on Friday.
How many people remain in Aleshki, who are actually in the “kill zone,” is unknown.
After the evacuation from Aleshki was completed, both Lantratova and Lubinets proposed carrying out other humanitarian actions similar to helping the residents of Aleshki in the future. There have been no official comments on this proposal from Moscow and Kyiv yet.
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