Kharkiv is largely Russian-speaking and used to be instinctively Russophile. Most of its residents are shocked by the Russian attack
, Ukraine’s second city, came to a flaming halt at the end of February. To the south, the hulk of a blasted tank remains on the road where it was destroyed, just before it reached the airport. In the north, the shell of an armoured personnel carrier lies opposite a home-improvements superstore. Look at the locations on the map and Russia’s military logic becomes clear. Both lie diametrically opposite one another on the ring road around the city.
Day and night the sound of artillery and missiles rumbles across the city. Fighting is concentrated in the north-eastern district of North Saltivka. Here, whole blocks of residential homes have been laid to waste. Smoke billows above them. According to soldiers in what is now an otherwise ghostly and deserted area, the Russians are only 1.5km away. Having failed to advance since their initial disastrous attempt to take the city, they are now digging defensive positions.
Also unclear is the number of people who remain. Mr Synyehubov says that of a pre-war population of around 1.5m he believes 1m are still there. That seems optimistic. Maria Avdeeva, a think-tanker turned wartime videographer charting the fate of her city, thinks the true number could be as few as 300,000. Nothing, except for a few supermarkets and chemists, is working. Wherever humanitarian aid is being distributed, there are queues of hundreds of people.
Although Kharkiv’s centre was subjected to heavy attacks earlier in the war, it is now mostly quiet. But the risk is that, at any time, a missile can strike. On March 27th one gouged a massive crater in front of a 19th-century fire-brigade building, gutting the school opposite it as well. On March 24th at least six people died when a missile struck while hundreds were queuing for aid at a distribution point in the north-east of the city.
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