Kherson residents reclaim streets during five-day pause in fighting

From October 27 to November 1, 2026, the skies over Kherson, Ukraine, were clear of drones and guided bombs for the first time in years. The pause in fighting, which lasted five days, was negotiated by First Lady Melania Trump and Pope Leo XIV. It covered a southern corner of the country that includes Kherson and the occupied town of Oleshky across the Dnipro River.

The truce was arranged primarily to aid Oleshky, a town Russian troops occupied in 2022 and mined extensively. Residents there reported surviving on pickles and boiled weeds because food and medicine rarely reached them. During the ceasefire, hundreds of Oleshky residents were evacuated on buses to northern Ukraine. Dmytro Lubinets, Ukraine’s ombudsman, credited Trump for ensuring the agreement was honored. He stated that he believes such truces can be upheld and respected by both sides.

In Kherson, the break from hostilities allowed a return to daily life. Russian forces occupied the city for several months in 2022 before local partisans helped Ukrainian soldiers push them out. Since 2024, Russian troops across the river have used first-person-view drones strapped with explosives to target residents. The city’s main highway and many streets are covered in heavy mesh nets to protect citizens from these attacks. With the drones gone, the nets seemed unnecessary as people filled the public spaces.

Olena Soboleva and Anna Herasimenko, both 21, walked the streets to meet up and visit a cafe decorated with cat paintings. Soboleva noted the absence of explosions, while Herasimenko observed that the city felt alive again. Herasimenko also visited a salon to get burgundy nail polish, describing the busy streets as resembling the past. At a Greek-style monument marking the city’s gateway, Svitlana Vorobiova, a retired police officer, took photos with her children. She had driven from a safer city to see her parents and her son, who had not visited his hometown in four years.

Volodymyr Mykolaienko, 66, a former mayor of Kherson, walked past the ruins of an administrative building. He was arrested by Russian troops in early 2022 and held as a prisoner of war until last year. The truce allowed him to visit his father’s grave in a part of the city usually filled with drones. He said he was able to pray and tell his father what was happening to their city. At a bus stop, oncology nurse Olena Yehorova listened to a man playing an accordion. She said the truce was a relief that let people breathe, though she remained cautious because she did not trust the Russians to keep their word indefinitely.

The ceasefire ended Sunday night. Yehorova looked up at the sky and said she expected new attacks to resume at any time. The return of the drone sounds signaled the end of the brief period of normalcy for Kherson and Oleshky.