Ukrainian evacuees reunite with family after years trapped in Russia-occupied city

There were raw emotional scenes as people evacuated from the devastated Russian-occupied city of Oleshky crossed from Belarus into the Ukrainian region of Chernihiv.

Families cried as they reunited with relatives they had not seen for years, with two sisters running and crying out as they embraced their father.

Some elderly residents were so weak they were carried on stretchers. They had been trapped in the frontline city without food, water and electricity, with many resorting to cooking garden weeds to survive.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked US First Lady Melania Trump for her efforts in brokering a local ceasefire that paved the way for their evacuation on Friday.

Upon their arrival, Dasha and Anya Palii sprinted across the tarmac screaming towards the bus carrying their father Mykhailo.

Their cries and their tears captured the sheer relief of three years of desperate worry, fearing they would never see him again.

Their mother Zhanna clasped Mykhailo’s face and stroked his forehead again and again, as if checking he was the same man she had left behind. He promised her, finally, they will now get married.

Tetiana and Volodymyr, an older couple carrying their cat, told the BBC they no longer have a home, after it was burned down in the first year of the war. They have been living in the abandoned house of a neighbour.

They said they instantly took the decision to leave but feared their journey could be disrupted. Now they have to work out where to go next and how to rebuild their lives.

Ukrainian military positions lie just 5km (3.1 miles) from Oleshky, but evacuees first had to travel through Russian-occupied territory to southern Russia, where they flew to Belarus, before finally being driven across Ukraine’s northern border on Saturday.

The oldest evacuee was 94 years old, while the youngest was one, according to Dmytro Lubinets, Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman.

Zelensky said in a post on X that “all of them will receive the assistance they need. It is important that government agencies and all the regional and local authorities involved work effectively and help our people adapt.”

Many people bear the scars: the convoy includes as many ambulances as coaches. The impact of years caught between the frontlines is written on the weary faces of many of Oleshky’s residents, some hobbling on crutches, others needing wheelchairs.

They have a lot to come to terms with, not least having left the place they call home.