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Avdiivka reveals a ruined city where residents huddle in basements

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AVDIIVKA, Ukraine – When the shelling begins, residents of this eastern Ukrainian city hardly flinch.

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In reality, the shelling barely stops.

Russian efforts to capture Avdiivka began more than a year ago and have intensified in recent weeks.

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On Monday, as a Ukrainian police evacuation team went from cellar to cellar trying again to get people to leave, every minute or two there was the thud of artillery from the Russian forces, who sometimes parked no more than 1.5km away.

Bakhmut, Ukraine, Sunday.  Russian forces fought for nine months to capture the city, advancing from three directions, but the Ukrainians held the western side.  Photo Libkos/Associated Press

Bakhmut, Ukraine, Sunday. Russian forces fought for nine months to capture the city, advancing from three directions, but the Ukrainians held the western side. Photo Libkos/Associated Press

“Do you feel it? It’s flying,” said one resident as a rocket passed overhead.

“Then a bang is heard,” he added during the detonation.

Moscow’s intensified shelling of Avdiivka and outlying towns is part of a larger offensive that has focused on the town of Bakhmut, some 34 miles to the northeast.

Although the latest Russian offensive failed to capture no city Importantly, their attacks continued to devastate parts of eastern Ukraine.

On Monday, the city’s military administrator, Vitaliy Barabash, ordered the remaining civil servants to leave and barred journalists and aid workers from entering, citing security concerns.

A team of journalists from THE New York Times he visited the city just before the ban was announced.

Avdiivka was once a dormitory neighborhood of Donetsk, the capital of the region that fell to Russian-backed separatists in 2014.

This has turned into Avdiivka in a frontline city and one of the first targets when Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, although the city remained in the hands of the Ukrainians.

Now, out of a pre-war population of 30,000, they say only hundreds still live in Avdiivka.

Ukrainian authorities said on Monday that five children had been abandoned.

Damage from bombing and rocket fire littered residential communities with rubble, nearly rendering the streets impracticable in the car.

Schools, clinics, shopping malls and apartment buildings have been left full of holes.

Pieces of unexploded ordnance litter the streets.

Most of the remaining residents are middle-aged or older.

During the months of terror, they took up residence in the basements beneath Soviet-era apartment buildings, setting up beds, makeshift kitchens, bookcases and small Orthodox shrines in large, candle-lit rooms.

Underground, the sound of artillery was barely audible.

Many occupants sat on their beds and stared into space.

With no electricity or running water, the cellars were damp and dark, and the air was stifling.

However, it was safer underground.

One retiree said she hadn’t been out in five months.

People stayed for various reasons.

Some said they were too sick, others too attached to the life they once lived.

Others say yes too poor move.

Some seemed too paralyzed after months of shelling to make the decision to flee.

“I’ve lived here for 43 years. How am I going to leave Avdiivka?” said Polina, an elderly resident, who came out of a basement to take cat food to a neighbor to check for damage in her apartment.

Like other interviewees for this article, he gave only his name, fearing for his safety.

“I understand that the most important thing is to stay alive.

“But at my advanced age I don’t want to jump from one department to another.”

A few yards from his apartment, a building was still smoking after a recent rocket impact.

In a border region with strong ties to the former Soviet Union, loyalties are sometimes divided.

Two older residents seemed to support Russia and they blamed both sides of the war to bomb their community.

Gennadiy Yudin, a Ukrainian medical police officer from Avdiivka, and another officer who came to evacuate the city on Monday were often turned away.

Many residents knew the agents from previous visits and were familiar with their attempts to persuade them.

One mother, Natalya, agreed to be evacuated with her 3-year-old daughter Marina.

She was distraught as she packed her few belongings into plastic bags, in part because she said she had no money to start a new life.

Most of the time, when officers approach, residents run to their basements and slam the door.

c.2023 The New York Times Society

Source: Clarin

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