Serhii Chaus, the mayor of the jap Ukrainian metropolis of Chasiv Yar, arrives at a bread supply location on the outskirts of city. Chaus goes each day into the embattled city to ship provides and meet residents who select to remain there as Russian forces are approaching the world.

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Serhii Chaus, the mayor of the jap Ukrainian metropolis of Chasiv Yar, arrives at a bread supply location on the outskirts of city. Chaus goes each day into the embattled city to ship provides and meet residents who select to remain there as Russian forces are approaching the world.

Claire Harbage/NPR

CHASIV YAR, Ukraine — Every morning, Mayor Serhii Chaus hundreds a van with bread, bottled water and scorching meals, places on his physique armor and begins driving to his hometown.

More than 13,000 individuals used to stay on this jap Ukrainian city earlier than Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. Now with Russian troops on Chasiv Yar’s doorstep, just a few hundred stay below fixed fireplace.

“I have to keep my fear checked, on the edge, so my body and mind can hold out,” he says. “Because the people there depend on me.”

Russian forces are actually approaching the outskirts of Chasiv Yar, according to the Institute for the Study of War, in an try and encircle and seize it as a part of a renewed Russian offensive on a number of fronts in jap Ukraine. The Washington-based assume tank estimates Russian forces have taken an extra 195 sq. miles of Ukraine — an space barely smaller than Chicago — since launching the offensive in October.

The onslaught stepped up in February, after Ukrainian troops withdrew from Avdiivka, a metropolis about 50 miles south of Chasiv Yar. The Ukrainian navy says its forces are low on ammunition due to delays in international support. Russian fighter jets pounded Ukrainian positions in Avdiivka consistently with extremely damaging glide bombs.

Avdiivka was the Kremlin’s first vital victory since final May, when Russian troops took control of the important thing industrial metropolis of Bakhmut, about 6 miles from Chasiv Yar.

“I know everyone in town”

Constant Russian assaults have pushed out most of Chasiv Yar’s residents and knocked out the city’s energy and operating water.

Still, the mayor is attempting to maintain the city working.

“We try to visit at least half of the neighborhoods in the city every day, to talk to people,” Chaus says. “Their needs must be recorded and understood, and we need to figure out how to solve them — and whether it’s even possible to solve them.”

Razor wire might be seen on the outskirts of Chasiv Yar.

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Razor wire might be seen on the outskirts of Chasiv Yar.

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There are many issues. How to get individuals to a health care provider or discover them the appropriate medication. How to repair buildings destroyed daily. How to evacuate those that need to go away. How to maintain those that keep heat and fed.

Locals who’ve stayed in Chasiv Yar attempt to assist the mayor. He brings up what’s left of the utilities division, now run by a lady in her 70s. Chaus says the lady initially left Chasiv Yar however grew anxious in exile.

“She was gone for about six months and then told me, ‘Find me a job, I want to go back,’ ” he says. “And now she’s here, exposed to danger.”

He says her crew, composed principally of aged volunteers, now delivers firewood and sweeps the streets, even throughout shelling. Chaus cannot all the time attain them, however he tries.

“I know everyone in town,” he says. “I know all their faces, and most by name.”

“It was home”

Chaus, who’s 43, seems to be like a next-door neighbor out of central casting — pleasant, bespectacled, with a trim, salt-and-pepper beard. He spent almost his whole life in Chasiv Yar. When he speaks about it, he generally makes use of the previous sense.

“It was a small town centered around people’s lives,” he says. “In one word, it was home.”

In his reminiscence, his hometown was a country paradise surrounded by ponds and forests, birds chirping, the air scented with recent earth and blossoms.

“There was this pond, Goldfish, which had this incredibly beautiful oak grove,” he says. “We gathered there with our families. Everyone had their favorite spot where they could sit for an hour and meditate in nature.”

That peace was first damaged in April 2014, when Russia recruited armed, pro-Kremlin native militias to occupy components of Donetsk area, the place Chasiv Yar is situated.

“I know everyone in town,” Mayor Chaus says. “I know all their faces, and most by name.”

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“I know everyone in town,” Mayor Chaus says. “I know all their faces, and most by name.”

Claire Harbage/NPR

“This area has been under siege for 10 years,” Chaus says. “And then came the full-scale invasion.”

Martial legislation went into impact, and Chaus was appointed head of the native navy administration, one thing like a wartime mayor. Like different wartime officers in Ukraine, he usually clothes head to toe in military inexperienced. His spouse and youngsters have been moved to security way back, and he has helped evacuate hundreds of different residents, particularly after the autumn of Bakhmut. Most of those that stay are aged.

“They no longer cling to the future,” he says. “They cling to the past. Some say their lives are over. I tell them there is still life ahead, and every day should be bright.”

Though Chaus spends most of his waking hours touring out and in of Chasiv Yar, he sleeps within the close by metropolis of Kramatorsk, a significant hub within the east for humanitarian support. Being there permits him to gather meals, filtered water, firewood and blankets and ship them to his constituents.

Home on the entrance line

Last month, NPR joins Chaus and his deputy, Ruslan Pryimenko, on certainly one of his each day journeys to Chasiv Yar.

“Let’s see what we can get done today,” Chaus says, as air raid sirens blare.

Mayor Chaus and his deputy fill a van with bread and bottled water for residents in Chasiv Yar as air raid sirens blare.

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Mayor Chaus and his deputy fill a van with bread and bottled water for residents in Chasiv Yar as air raid sirens blare.

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It takes about 90 minutes to drive from Kramatorsk to Chasiv Yar. The males have already loaded up their van with bottled water. Halfway via, they cease at a city to select up loaves of freshly baked bread and trays of scorching borsch, the thick beet-and-meat stew that is Ukraine’s nationwide dish.

Another air raid siren wails as they placed on helmets and bullet-resistant vests and examine to ensure their tourniquets work. Chaus additionally asks the NPR reporting crew to close off its cellphones so Russian forces cannot observe the sign.

He provides the crew a two-way radio to remain in contact with him and Pryimenko and asks to not wander round with out them, particularly on the method to Chasiv Yar.

“We know these roads, you don’t,” Chaus says. “Don’t be stupid.”

As he nears Chasiv Yar, the mayor sees the forests he recalled earlier, the place he as soon as meditated in nature.

The timber are actually useless, the ponds an ashy grey. Instead of households having pond-side picnics, there are freshly dug trenches.

“Shield town”

In Chasiv Yar, the streets are empty. The buildings look crushed and empty. The air smells burnt, heavy with the stench of gunpowder and the propellant of spent munitions.

Chaus and Pryimenko cease outdoors the ruins of a mini-market. Still intact above the doorway hangs an indication with pictures of the sweets, bread and sausage you as soon as may purchase right here. Chaus clenches his jaw and begins unloading his van.

“We’re going to try to deliver this food,” he says, “and then we’ll see how things go.”

Drones fly overhead. There are explosions each few seconds.

Tetiana Procenko would not flinch as she emerges from the ruins of the mini-market, the place she’s been sheltering.

Tetiana Procenko is likely one of the few remaining residents residing in Chasiv Yar regardless of the encroaching Russian troops.

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Tetiana Procenko is likely one of the few remaining residents residing in Chasiv Yar regardless of the encroaching Russian troops.

Claire Harbage/NPR

“Oh borsch!” she says, because the mayor fingers her containers of the still-hot, beet-red stew. “And thanks a lot for the bread.”

Procenko is 64, a retired college guard. She will share the meals the mayor introduced with their neighbors.

Asked if she’s scared right here and why she will not go away for someplace safer, she says, “Where can I go? And how can I support myself? I left [Chasiv Yar] and came back, and then left and came back again. I don’t have enough money to support myself.”

Procenko says her pension is just too small to stay on, and the Ukrainian state would not supply sufficient support to discover a respectable place to stay as an internally displaced particular person.

“At least this is our home,” Procenko says of Chasiv Yar.

The mayor calls Chasiv Yar a “shield town.” He says it is taking a lot fireplace to protect a much bigger metropolis, Kostiantynivka, which has a railway hub the Russians need.

The rail hub

The railway station in Kostiantynivka was destroyed in a Russian strike in late February.

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The railway station in Kostiantynivka was destroyed in a Russian strike in late February.

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Kostiantynivka is roughly 12 miles away from Chasiv Yar. In late February, Russian forces bombed the prepare station, now a pile of rubble. But the rail traces that either side want to provide troops are intact.

The blast additionally broken a church throughout the road. Workers are repairing its spires and damaged home windows. In the church courtyard, a gray-haired man is sweeping up damaged glass and gathering small items of concrete. He says his identify is Hennady however would not need to give a final identify as a result of he says he fears for his security.

“When will they just sit down and negotiate a peace settlement?” he asks. “Everyone here wants this war to stop. Everyone is tired.”

A Russian jet flies overhead. Hennady retains working even after the warplane drops a bomb someplace within the distance.

A plume of smoke from an airstrike close to Kostiantynivka might be seen from a distance.

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A plume of smoke from an airstrike close to Kostiantynivka might be seen from a distance.

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Kostiantynivka’s residents have been watching with dread as Russian forces pummel Chasiv Yar. Parts of jap Ukraine have been below Russian management for a decade. They describe Russian occupation like a most cancers slowly metastasizing towards them — to kill them.

“Living on the front line, knowing that every day your life can end, that puts a lot of pressure on your psyche, your physical health,” says 31-year-old Kristina Vasyliuk, who used to work in arts administration. “You may not realize it until it hits you all at once.”

“I remember people burning”

People line up for humanitarian support at a handout location in Kostiantynivka.

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People line up for humanitarian support at a handout location in Kostiantynivka.

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Vasyliuk’s voice generally quivers when she talks about Kostiantynivka and the humanitarian middle right here she helps run. The city’s utilities nonetheless present energy and water however many residents want meals and well being provides. The middle additionally helps a whole lot of internally displaced Ukrainians from locations like Bakhmut, Vasyliuk’s hometown.

“They lived in basements,” she says. “They refused to go outside.”

Bakhmut is the location of the bloodiest battle within the Ukraine battle, lasting from July 2022 to May 2023. Thousands of troopers from either side have been killed there, together with one of Ukraine’s most decorated battalion commanders, 27-year-old Dmytro Kotsiubailo, recognized by his name signal Da Vinci.

Russian troops used cannon-fodder ways there for nearly a yr and eventually took the town final May, after destroying it. Vasyliuk fears the identical finish for Kostiantynivka.

Kristina Vasyliuk works at a humanitarian middle in Kostiantynivka the place individuals come for provides.

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Kristina Vasyliuk works at a humanitarian middle in Kostiantynivka the place individuals come for provides.

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“I can say from experience that people will stay here until the last moment, until the situation is absolutely critical,” she says.

She survived the bombing of Kostiantynivka’s major market final September. More than a dozen individuals died. She says it modified her profoundly.

“I remember people burning,” she says. “When I stopped shaking, I caught myself thinking that I could have died right here and now. It passes, this fear of losing your life, it passes very quickly when you are here.”

She says she appears like she ought to keep in Kostiantynivka and assist. She sees that the humanitarian middle wants her. But in the previous few weeks, she has been attempting to make sense of her numbness to hazard.

“Every time I hear a bomb hit, I tell myself, it won’t hit me again, at least not today,” she says. Then she reminds herself: “Your family is worried about you, your life is just beginning.”

Buildings broken by Russian strikes in Kostiantynivka. The sounds of artillery, mortar rounds and bombs dropped from planes are heard daily.

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Buildings broken by Russian strikes in Kostiantynivka. The sounds of artillery, mortar rounds and bombs dropped from planes are heard daily.

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“I constantly ask myself, ‘Should I stay or should I go?’ ” she says.

She sees and hears explosions daily — from artillery, mortar rounds and bombs dropped from planes. The combating is transferring nearer.

“Today isn’t the loudest day”

Back in Chasiv Yar, below fixed fireplace, Mayor Chaus is evaluating the right way to get to the opposite aspect of city, which is nearer to the frontline and rather more harmful.

Chaus checks in with residents in Chasiv Yar.

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Chaus checks in with residents in Chasiv Yar.

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He desires to see the city’s de-facto utilities director, the retiree in her 70s who returned right here. The girl is the aunt of his deputy, Pryimenko.

“When she left Chasiv Yar, the light just went out of her eyes,” Pryimenko says. “Now that she’s returned, life has returned to her. She is tireless, even though she knows she may die.”

The mayor says the utilities crew could also be sweeping the streets. War or not, he says, it is a matter of dignity. He desires to assist.

An explosion hits close by. It’s loud sufficient that the mini-market vibrates. The mayor just isn’t fazed.

“These are the conditions we work in,” he says. “And today isn’t the loudest day.”

He returns to his van and drives via what’s left of his hometown.

Chaus returns to his van to go to extra residents who’re nonetheless residing in his hometown, regardless of close by explosions from the battle’s entrance line.

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Chaus returns to his van to go to extra residents who’re nonetheless residing in his hometown, regardless of close by explosions from the battle’s entrance line.

Claire Harbage/NPR

NPR producer Hanna Palamarenko contributed to this report from Kyiv.