Kyiv seeks truce to evacuate 6,000 civilians from Oleshky amid famine
Ukraine’s human rights commissioner describes the situation in Russian-occupied Oleshky as a disaster, with the International Committee of the Red Cross ready to provide transport pending Moscow’s agreement on a supervised corridor.
The Ukrainian government has formally requested the evacuation of up to 6,000 civilians, including approximately 200 children, from the Russian-occupied city of Oleshky in the Kherson region. Kyiv describes the situation as a humanitarian disaster, citing severe shortages of food, medicine, fuel, and clean water following the destruction of infrastructure and the 2023 collapse of the Kakhovka dam.
Tetyana Hasanenko, head of the Oleshky Military Administration, stated that food supplies collapsed in February, leading to effective famine conditions from March. A single supply truck arrived on 4 May, but no further deliveries have been made since. Residents are forced to cook with open fires as electricity and refrigeration remain unavailable, while the local hospital operates on generators with critically low fuel reserves.
Ukraine’s Commissioner for Human Rights Dmytro Lubinets confirmed that the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced at the end of April its readiness to supply as many buses as needed for the evacuation. However, Kyiv is currently awaiting Moscow’s confirmation of a truce date to establish supervised humanitarian corridors. Lubinets noted that technical details have been coordinated, but the operation requires international supervision to ensure safety.
Informal evacuation efforts continue, with volunteers helping residents navigate minefields that now block all access roads. Former resident Ksenia Archipova reports that evacuees are being taken to the Russian-occupied city of Skadovsk, then through Russia to the Ukrainian-Belarusian border. This route requires Russian passports; those with only Ukrainian identification documents face severe delays or are stranded at checkpoints.
The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry intends to raise the issue with the United Nations and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Officials describe the occupation authorities as using civilians as human shields and raising bureaucratic hurdles to prevent those without Russian citizenship from leaving the occupied territories.
