The village of Khotine, just a few kilometers from the border, is constantly disrupted by missile fire. On site, the fear of a new offensive persists.
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While Europe has reached an agreement for aid of 50 billion euros granted to Ukraine, on the front, the figures continue to be staggering. Thursday, February 1, in the Sumy region, in the north of the country, 216 shells fell on border villages and in particular on Khotine, a town very close to the border with Russia. Here, the trauma of winter 2022 continues and the fear of a new land invasion remains strong.
“They are unpredictable”
Oleg is not the type to waste his strength on the snowy sidewalks of his village: he places his heavy leather bag on a sled that he drags. Russia is nine kilometers from his home. It’s within artillery range. Oleg no longer remembers when he last had a good night: “Two years ago… There, now, it’s quite calm, but it can happen that sometimes it flies and it whistles over your head”, he warns.
On his cell phone, he then spontaneously shows a video: it is in the courtyard of a house in the village that a Grad rocket falls. A few weeks ago, this time it was a company that was affected. But it is above all the fear of a new land invasion that worries Oleg. He describes precisely having seen hundreds of tanks pass by the route he is taking: “All the identification papers are well stored. I even prepared underwear, socks and a change of shirt. Not too many belongings and of course, some groceries. They are unpredictable. It’s impossible to hear with them. They don’t understand and they don’t understand anything.”
“Everything can happen !”
Oleg visits his younger sister, Svetlana. With her sleeves rolled up while the thermometer is below zero, she assures that she has confidence in her army: “Who knows, anything can happen! The Russians still have more men than us. Ours are more in the East, in Avdiivka. It’s scary there”
“The Russians know that our troops are not deployed around here much. The idea of them crossing the border again scares me, of course. Our soldiers will not abandon us and that is reassuring.”
Ukrainian soldiers sleep in houses in the village. There are no more military gatherings in one place. The school where they were staying was bombed, presumably because of an informant.
In Ukraine, on the border with Russia, residents fear a new land invasion. The report in Khotine by Vanessa Descouraux, Jérémy Tuil and Yachar Fazylov