On a hill overlooking Raisina strategically important city retaken by Ukrainian forces, the assembled residents say they are “happy” to be able to leave their homes and call their relatives after months of occupation and fighting.

Sunday morning 61 year old Nadya Nesolena was on the street when the first Ukrainian soldiers entered this city, which before the war consisted of almost 50,000 inhabitants. “We greeted them with tears in our eyes. We have been waiting for them for several months (…) we are very happy,” a woman told AFP with a mobile phone in her hand. On this hill is the only antenna from where you can receive a signal for mobile phones.

Russian occupation “it was difficult, but we were lucky, we have a house with a basement and food”he added.

Standing on a hill overlooking the city, oh Yuri Kurotska “He has no words” to express his joy. “All bad things come to an end,” philosophizes a 64-year-old man who went there to call his relatives who left for Kharkiv and Kyiv in March when Russian troops arrived in the area. He appealed to the liberating Ukrainian soldiers: “Please don’t leave again. Don’t leave us with the Russians again!.

Thick white smoke shrouded the rooftops of this northeastern Ukrainian city, from where the last Russian troops retreated Saturday evening in the face of a Ukrainian advance. The Russian ammunition depot where the explosion occurred on Saturday was still on fire today.

OUR Grigory PivovarThe 61-year-old also met the first Ukrainian soldiers on Sunday morning. “We cried, we were so happy to see our people.” Now he can freely go outside and walk around the almost deserted city in the company of his 16-year-old son Kirill.

Many residents told AFP that their pro-Russian neighbors fled east before the Kremlin forces left. According to Moscowmany thousands of people have arrived in Russia in recent days.

The fighting over the past six months in this city, located near the Kharkov front and captured by the Russians in the spring, has left open wounds. As a result of the bombing, residential buildings, shops, a church, two bridges, and a school were damaged. The Ukrainian flag was raised over the burned-out town hall. And soldiers patrol the streets.

Occupied with the defense of the city, the soldiers did not have time to take down large banners with the Russian flag and the inscription: “We are with Russia, one people” on Sunday.