Seventy-seven-year-old Lyubov Lobunets, evacuated her residence in the conflict-ridden city in Ukraine of the city of Kupiansk in August when it was struck by a enemy projectile.
“My apartment was in a five-story structure,” she shared, recounting from a facility for those forced to leave in nearby Kharkiv. “It’s unclear whether it was a enemy weapon that damaged the apartment, but it caused flames to erupt, and when the blaze engulfed my floor, I was stuck because the exit was blocked and I was unable to get out.”
The national defense troops, she said, rescued her. But by then much of Kupiansk, which had a population before the war of 27 thousand people, had left. “Before I finally evacuated, there were a handful of stores still open,” she said. “But that last month, almost everything closed. Community support systems were relocated.”
Amid the focus on the Donbas region further in the southern part and its urban centers, including Pokrovsk, this northern city in the Kharkiv’s northern area on the Oskil river has been overlooked. But the gradual destruction of the city, as it used to be, dragged out over an extended period, is a representation for the cities of Ukraine’s frontline, worn down in the jaws of Russia’s slow-moving combine of violence.
No longer exists the downtown marketplace selling preserved fish, honey and vegetables. Homes that dotted the incline are destroyed by artillery. The open areas outside the city adjacent to the river are punctuated by shell holes.
Yet Lobunets explained her reluctance to evacuate. “I served as a nurse and my retirement income is minimal,” she said. “I worried of where I’d live and how I’d manage.”
As recently as a short time back some of her friends had chosen to remain despite a mandatory evacuation directive, and as urban combat reached some of the Kupiansk outskirts. The majority of those still there in the urban core are clustered close to the athletic arena.
“A few acquaintances called to tell me they had climbed up to the top floor to obtain a phone service,” said Lobunets. “They could see structures everywhere that had been leveled and flames across the city.”
Occupied in the initial stages of the widespread Russian invasion, Kupiansk was liberated in September 2022, with minimal destruction as Russian forces pulled back towards the border.
The devastation followed subsequently, as Russian forces sought to capture it a second time, targeting it with air and ground attacks. Its forces progressed to their ongoing semi-blockade, with invading forces now in some positions on the Oskil’s west bank.
When Kupiansk’s mayor, the mayor, was questioned two years ago, it was in his office in the urban core. Currently located in Kharkiv, he has failed to return to the city since the summer.
“The situation are extremely challenging in Kupiansk. It is on the very edge of hostilities. The Russians are seeking to seize the city. They are applying force daily. They have put up flags at the edge of the city and attempted to declare that they have captured it, but it stays in Ukrainian hands,” he said.
Nowadays, he said, there are no buildings that are intact and nothing works. There is no heating fuel and no electrical supply. “Based on available data, there are just over 600 people on the left bank of the Oskil River,” said the mayor. “Evacuations occur everyday, and now the relocation perimeter has been expanded because there are invading troops on the opposite shore, which the military is trying to push out.”
Formerly proclaimed a “place of valor” by the Ukrainian president, President Zelenskyy, the Russian attack and the Ukrainian defence of the city have been fierce and brutal.
While Russian forces have faced difficulties crossing the waterway – which in this region is between 10 to 30 meters across – with their tanks and transports, a number have arrived at the western bank by sneaking via abandoned pipelines, a metre in diameter, Ukrainian forces say.
On the national forces’ end, the troop formations in the area have utilized the strategy of releasing razor-sharp nets from their reconnaissance drones to trap Russian infantry and vehicles who struggle to detect and increasingly difficult to get away.
For both sides the extensive deployment of aerial devices has made navigating in the city and the surrounding countryside dangerous, particularly in cars and trucks.
In his headquarters, Captain “Caesar” and the military personnel of the designated unit who are operating just in the northern sector of the city scanned live drone footage of rural landscapes on the eastern side of the river for invading forces’ actions.
They instructed a pilot positioned in the combat zone to hover over a dense area of scrub and fallen birch where they thought a enemy outpost might be located. “Look! Here. Look.” Several soldiers gathered around the display. “Could this be the opening to a fortification?” They peered, seeking evidence of presence. There was no activity.
“After we came here our brigade assumed defensive posts that the earlier unit had relinquished,” said the captain. “During our tenure, we haven’t lost any territory and now we are achieving minor gains advancing.
“The enemy troops started using the conduit to move across at the end of July, but now every access point to the tubes are under our control. We’ve also seen some attempts to bring vehicles across the river, but each time they attempt to construct a crossing we sink them.”
The enemy strategy now is to transport tiny groups of infantry across to {areas
