Page 71 - bneMag Dec22

bne December 2022 Eastern Europe I 71
“We finally took [Vysokopillya] on the 3rd of September,” says Oleksandr,
a combat medic with the 96th. “The school here was their main base,” he says, gesturing at a ruined nearby building, its roof caved in by artillery strikes. “It was filled with ammunition and every type of weapon,” he says.
By all accounts, the fighting here was some of the fiercest of the war, involving some of Russia’s most well- trained troops.
“[The Russians] took this town at the very start of the war,” says Oleksandr. “They had a lot of time to fortify it – it was the centre of their whole defensive line here [in northeast Kherson].
They had several thousand soldiers, all professional troops – no mobilized men. But they fight for refrigerators and washing machines – we fight for our own land,” he says, referencing the many videos that have appeared of Russian soldiers looting home appliances from occupied settlements.
"If they find us all here, they will simply shoot us"
A little further south, the village of Velika Oleksandrivka is perhaps in even worse shape, if such a thing were possible. Blackened buildings with the scorch-marks of artillery and rocket fire are everywhere, while regular tank revetments (barricades) speak to how recently it was liberated – Ukrainian forces recovered the settlement only on October 4th.
On one of the village’s main streets stands a house, once handsome but now ruined by a gaping hole in the roof – the result of a rocket strike. Despite this, it is still inhabited by Serhiy and Olga Balan, as well as their two young children. They described what it was like watching Russian soldiers roll
into their town – and then into their home itself – shortly after the invasion began.
“I remember the first day the Russians came,” says Serhiy, a policeman. He had been hosting a number of his colleagues at his house after the war began – their houses, closer to the
police station itself, were thought to be at risk of collateral damage if the station was targeted.
“We heard from our neighbour that [the Russians] were in the city, and that
immediately asked where my husband was – I lied and said he was in the hospital, sick with covid. They didn’t search our house, thank God. There were so many of them here – more than a thousand staying in the school across
“I told the other policemen at our house, ‘guys, you have to go, because if they find us all here, they will simply shoot us”
they were coming to check the houses on our block. They were coming down the street, shooting dogs, shooting
at houses randomly. I told the other policemen at our house, ‘guys, you have to go, because if they find us all here, they will simply shoot us,” Serhiy says.
He and his colleagues hid their uniforms and weapons in the garage and fled to his grandfather’s house, out behind their building on the next block. His wife was left to answer the door when the Russian soldiers arrived.
“Just a few minutes after [Serhiy and his colleagues] left, the Russians came to our door,” Olga Balan says. “They
the street, with all their armoured vehicles and personnel carriers. They went from house to house, looking for anyone they thought might give them problems,” Olga says.
There was another problem: Olga was seven months pregnant when Velika Oleksandrivka was occupied. Her due date came just weeks later after.
“It was very scary to give birth to a
child in that environment,” she says. “There were no doctors, no hospital working – the Russians would not allow us to leave. My husband snuck into
the house and helped me give birth in the basement, just the two of us.
Serhiy and Olga Balan plan to rebuild their destroyed house. / Neil Hauer/bne IntelliNews
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