Oleshky residents wait six days for aid as truce starts later

The White House announced on Friday that a temporary ceasefire will begin in Oleshky on October 29.

The delay leaves the city's residents without guaranteed access to food or medical supplies for six days after the agreement was publicized. Officials stated the truce is designed to allow humanitarian aid to enter the Russian-occupied territory and to prepare a civilian evacuation route along a designated safe passage.

Melania Trump was credited with securing the arrangement. A White House statement said she and her representative worked directly with Russian and Ukrainian leadership to set the terms. The first lady described the situation in the front-line city as dire. She noted that the remaining population consists mostly of elderly people who need medical attention, medicine, food, and clean water.

Oleshky sits across the Dnipro River from Kherson. The White House estimated the current population at between 1,700 and 2,000 residents, including about 50 children. That number is down from roughly 24,000 before the war began. The statement added that about 90 percent of the city is flooded following the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam.

Under the terms of the deal, non-military teams from both countries will visit residents in their homes. These teams will help arrange transport for anyone who wants to leave for either Russia or Ukraine. Ukraine's top negotiator, David Arakhamia, confirmed on Telegram that the humanitarian operation starts once the ceasefire takes hold. He said the accord involved a long process with both Melania Trump and Pope Leo.

The Kremlin indicated that the evacuation would take at least a few days to organize. Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly told Pope Leo by telephone last week that he was ready to cooperate on the issue. Russian Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov stated that Russian forces will stop firing from 4 a.m. local time on October 27 to support the operation. This pre-ceasefire pause is two days before the official start of the truce.

Separate diplomatic tracks are advancing in parallel with the local truce. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that negotiators from Ukraine, Russia, and the United States agreed to hold technical-level talks in Abu Dhabi in the first half of November. Zelenskyy told the Hudson Institute that he spoke with U.S. envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff after their meeting with Putin earlier in the week. He stated that any peace deal would require strong security guarantees and 10 years of funding for Ukraine's army.

The announcements follow two weeks of criticism from European allies and U.S. political figures over the administration's involvement in the war. President Donald Trump had previously struck a deal with Putin to import diesel and announced a ceasefire on energy attacks, although Russia continued its fire. On October 14, Zelenskyy noted that SpaceX had restricted Starlink service, a move Ukrainian officials say hampers strikes and drone defense.

Fighting continued on Friday in other areas. Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport briefly suspended operations due to a Ukrainian drone threat. Mayor Sergei Sobyanin reported that air defenses downed 21 drones headed for the capital over two hours. In a related development, the two sides exchanged 270 prisoners each. Ukraine's acting prosecutor general, Anton Kovalskyi, said more than 19,000 Ukrainian civilians, including 762 children, have been killed since the full-scale invasion began.