On Wednesday evening, the mayor of Kherson wrote on Facebook that he had "armed visitors" in the city administration.

He did not write who these visitors were – but it was clear that they were not Ukrainians.

Reports had been mounting throughout the day that the port city at the mouth of the Dnipro in the Black Sea was the first major Ukrainian city to be completely taken by the Russian attackers.

"I didn't promise you anything.

I'm only interested in the viability of our city," wrote Mayor Igor Kolychayev.

Reinhard Veser

Editor in Politics.

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The mayor explained that he was working to deal with the aftermath of the invasion: "We are experiencing colossal difficulties with collecting and burying the dead, with the delivery of food and medicine, with garbage collection." Apparently there is some kind of agreement with the Occupiers: A curfew from 8:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. Only cars transporting food, medicine and the like are allowed to drive in the city – and only at walking speed.

Pedestrians are only allowed to walk in pairs, shouldn't provoke the military, shouldn't get involved in conflicts, should stop immediately if asked.

Between fighting courage and dejection

The situation in the city, which is on the way from Crimea to inland Ukraine, is apparently unsettled.

"At 2.30 a.m. there was fire with something heavy," wrote a scientist from Cherson in an email to a German colleague on Thursday night.

Since the Russian incursion began last week, he has reported regularly on developments in Kherson, often in multiple emails a day.

They are a testament to how war broke out in the lives of peaceful people, how their mood fluctuated between fighting courage and depression, how they tried to organize their everyday life, how order collapsed.

“While residents of Mykolayiv, Odessa or Cherkassy are just starting out, we already have experience and know when to put our feet up.

For example this constant irritability, the result of stress and insomnia, which you have to give an outlet for,” said an email on the evening of the third day of the war.

"If one settlement is under fire, the other settlement is warned." From the very first day of the attack, civilian targets in Kherson were fired upon: the market, houses, a kindergarten.

There were deaths among the civilian population.

"In the meantime, a car and its occupants burned down on the bridge," it said laconically in an email from Friday night last week, summarizing the events of the first day.

Violent din of battle alternates with periods of relative silence as people follow who is firing.

"I can hardly believe it and I'm happy about the cannon fire from howitzers and tanks at the moment," the man wrote in the early morning of the third day of the war.

"The ongoing fighting shows that our forces have not disappeared, we are fighting back." This hope is accompanied by doubts: "I just don't know why they don't blow up the bridge?

After all, endless columns of Russian soldiers are coming over the bridge from the Crimea.” By the third day of the war, the shops had run out of bread and dairy products.

The daily errands are accompanied by constant danger.

While a friend was waiting in the car while shopping, "a Rashkin fighter plane flew over him at 100 meters and dropped a bomb further to the east".