Ukraine’s soldiers and civilians on the cessation -Fires of Russia

Hours in the cessation -the fire that Russia had called up, we drove into the Donetsk region in Oostenekraine to see what the possible impact had.

The Ukrainian army escorted us to an artillery position, southwest of the brightly disputed city of Pokrovsk.

Conducted skies made the ride through mud tracks that ran past wide open fields, slightly less vulnerable to drones attacks.

Russian President Vladimir Putin had suggested a three-day ceasefire on 8 May to start with midnight local time, to coincide with the birthday of the end of the Second World War in Europa-a holiday in Russia on Friday known as Victory Day.

But from the artillery position we heard the sounds of continuous explosions -incoming and outgoing mortar fire -proof that there was no ceases -the bones in the trenches and on the front lines.

I asked Serhii, one of the soldiers of the 3rd operational brigade of the National Guard if there were attacks from Russia at night.

“Yes, they attacked at night. We had sliding bombs and drones here. Russia cannot be trusted.” In the evening they call a truce and in the morning there is no ceasefire.

A few minutes later he received the coordinates of a target via the radio. A few soldiers walked through deep muddy trenches, to an open space where a Houwser was hidden from view, covered with branches and leaves. They discovered it, be in the right direction and shot. It left a deafening sound and the recoil blew leaves and dust from the ground.

The Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had rejected Russia’s unilateral three-day ceasefires. Instead, he has called for a longer 30-day ceasefire, as proposed by the US, a proposal that has been repeated again by President Donald Trump on his social social platform on Thursday evening.

Trump has even threatened that Washington and its partners would impose further sanctions if it is striking -the fire is not respected.

As the exhaustion war makes up, each side tried to wear the other, I asked, Max, a 26-year-old soldier how he felt about global diplomatic efforts that insist on a ceasefire.

“You don’t think about such things when you are here. You must have ‘tunnel vision’. You can’t let emotions dictate your actions. You wait for a command and act, and if there is no command, you will find a way to spend your time. But you don’t let this come in your mind,” he said.

We drive to the north of the artillery position, to the city of Dobropillya, which is approximately 12 miles (19 km) of Russian positions. Thousands of people still live in the city, including many of those forced to move because their home tensions have become too dangerous to live in.

We meet Svitlana who comes from Pokrovsk, but now has moved to Dobropillya. I asked her if she thought the cease -the fires of Russia had made some difference on the ground. “You can hear the sounds here,” she said, referring to the constant sounds of explosion, such as Rolling Thunder, which we could hear from the edge of the city. “That is the sound of the cessation -the fires of Russia. That’s why I say we should never trust them.”

Twenty-six-year-old Serhiy Chimes in: “The ceasefire is announced to confuse people and cheat on them, and so they (Russia) can say to the world” that we are so good, we try to get Ukraine through peaceful means “but in reality everything they do is the opposite of it.”

In the most important market in Dobropillya we meet the 65-year-old Oleksandr. “It was quieter last night. Before we heard Shahed Drones flying regularly,” he said. “But now we hear alarms again and I am not sure if I can see a file.”

As he talks, his face grumbles in a sob. “I am afraid. I have my wife and son here. I am very afraid of my family. I am afraid that we might be forced to flee our houses,” he said.

Additional reporting by Ixogen Anderson, VolodyMyr Lozhko, Sanjay Gangly and Anastasiia Levchenko.