Kherson Endures Relentless Russian Attacks as White House Pushes Fragile Peace
KHERSON, Ukraine — In this southern frontline city, the hum of Russian drones is a constant companion. For Natalia Sergienko, a humanitarian worker and director of the Kherson Power of the South public organization, the past month brought two narrow escapes.
The first came as she drove through the so-called “red zone” — an area Russian military-linked Telegram channels have declared open to fire, even though it includes densely populated parts of Kherson. “Thank god, it flew past my car, then it was shot down,” Sergienko told ABC News in an interview in early September.
Days later, she was taking a phone call near her organization’s humanitarian headquarters when she heard a drone behind her. “It was not far,” she recalled. Sergienko ran for cover. “The basement saved me,” she said.
Such moments are routine in Kherson. The city sits on the banks of the Dnipro River, which since Ukraine liberated Kherson in the fall of 2022 has formed the southern frontline between Ukrainian and Russian forces. Every day, Russian artillery, drones, missiles and air-dropped bombs rain down from the opposite bank.
Local officials say Russian attacks on the city kill or injure about 20 people each day. It was in Kherson that the phrase “human safari” was coined to describe Russian FPV drone operators hunting civilians. Videos of such attacks are regularly posted on Russian military-aligned Telegram channels. The United Nations’ Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine has said the attacks amount to crimes against humanity.
A peace push far from the front line
As the White House stirs new, if distant, hopes for a deal to end Russia’s full-scale invasion — now deep into its fifth year — frontline cities such as Kherson, Kharkiv and Kramatorsk face the prospect of an open-ended war no matter what is agreed in Moscow or Kyiv.
The Kherson region is one of four the Kremlin claimed to have annexed after September 2022 referenda widely dismissed as sham votes. Those four regions — Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk and Luhansk — sit on both the geographic and ideological frontlines of Russia’s war.
Oleksandr Tolokonnikov, deputy head of the Kherson Regional Military Administration, told ABC News that almost 80% of Kherson’s pre-war population of about 283,000 has already left — some in the opening days of the invasion before Russian forces occupied the city, others since its November 2022 liberation.
Local government data shared with ABC News shows at least 1,502 people, including 40 children, have been killed by Russian fire in the Kherson region since the full-scale invasion began in February 2022. Another 9,625 people have been injured. At least 46,900 civilian infrastructure facilities have been damaged or destroyed, including more than 44,500 homes and apartment buildings.
FPV drones and a widening campaign
FPV drones pose an omnipresent threat, Tolokonnikov said. Residents get no warning when the small craft cross the river to attack, and those guided by fiber-optic wires — increasingly common — are difficult to jam. “Russian occupiers use them as a tool of deliberate terror against civilians — drone operators don’t care who they target,” he said. Civilians on foot, including children, as well as taxis, buses and even ambulances are routinely attacked.
The drones are “a really huge problem,” Tolokonnikov continued. In August alone, authorities recorded 27,210 Russian drones launched across the river. FPV drones accounted for 80% of civilian casualties that month, killing 30 people and wounding 393 others. Russia is currently launching around 6,500 drones against Kherson each week.
The scale of Russian drone, artillery and air-dropped bomb attacks is increasing, he said. In the first half of 2026, Russian jets dropped 117 aerial bombs on the Kherson region. Across the 31 days of August, they dropped 100.
An energy crisis deepens
Alongside the nonstop attacks, the Ukrainian-held city is grappling with a severe energy crisis caused by Russian strikes. Earlier this month, Kherson Regional Military Administration head Oleksandr Prokudin urged residents to leave, warning that the city’s electricity supply is now equivalent to that received by a single Kyiv supermarket.
Ukrainian officials expect another winter of intense Russian strikes on energy infrastructure, a tactic Moscow has used each winter of the full-scale invasion in a bid to freeze the country into submission.
Kherson will not be able to rely on its remaining heat and power plant this winter, Tolokonnikov said. Russian guided aerial bombs destroyed the facility in August. Authorities expect 10% to 15% of remaining residents might leave for the winter months, he added, perhaps more if the situation deteriorates.
Diplomacy without a breakthrough
Last weekend’s shuttling of President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner between Moscow and Kyiv did not appear to jumpstart significant progress toward peace.
Witkoff, Kushner and officials in both capitals described the visits as productive, with Witkoff calling the diplomatic tour “very meaningful.” But there remains no indication that Russian President Vladimir Putin is ready to abandon his maximalist war goals, and no sign that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is willing to surrender swaths of territory in the east or accept Kremlin-imposed limits on Kyiv’s sovereignty.
When discussing U.S.-Russian diplomatic talks in February 2025, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Russian control over Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk and Luhansk is “undeniable and non-negotiable.” Peskov said last week that the recent Witkoff and Kushner visits represented “one small step toward peace.”
During the initial phase of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — from 2014 to the launch of the full-scale invasion in 2022 — the Minsk I and Minsk II agreements sought to end the fighting and chart a route toward peace. The accords failed, creating a frozen conflict with an ever-rising human toll that ultimately gave way to a full-scale invasion.
Many in Ukraine fear that those living along the current 754-mile front line may face a similar reality, even if the American negotiating team can force a deal to pause or nominally end Moscow’s full-scale invasion.
Any respite from the daily attacks would be welcome in Kherson, Tolokonnikov said. But the danger posed from the eastern side of the river “won’t disappear on its own.” In building a more secure city and region after the war eventually ends, he added, “we will not start from scratch, we will continue to use our experience of these years.”
‘A ceasefire is not peace’
Sergienko, the humanitarian worker, told ABC News she is concerned about a frozen war. “A ceasefire is not peace,” she said. “Even if a ceasefire is reached, it will likely be temporary. Russia has repeatedly broken agreements and failed to honor its promises, making it an aggressor that cannot be trusted. Accepting a pause without real security guarantees would be a huge risk for Ukraine.”
Four and a half years into the war, Sergienko said visits by peace delegations should be delivering results. “How many people have already died, how many cities and villages will be destroyed? Unfortunately, the end of the war is not in sight. The next visit should end this damn war.”
Ukrainian forces liberated Kherson from eight months of Russian occupation in November 2022, the victory crowning a 10-week Ukrainian counteroffensive on the southern front. Soldiers and civilians celebrated together in the streets, sharing fresh watermelons — a traditional symbol of Kherson.
The years since have seen that joy give way to exhaustion, Sergienko said. “Kherson is more than a frontline city — it is the shield of southern Ukraine, holding back the enemy, protecting the road to Mykolaiv and Odesa. The suffering our people endure each day is the price of preventing this war from spreading farther across the south.”
Life under Russian control
On the Russian-held side of the river — which accounts for around 75% of the Kherson region’s territory — Tolokonnikov said Ukrainians are still living under severe duress.
Food, medicine, water, gas and electricity are all in short supply, he said, while Russian troops are prioritized for treatment at scant medical facilities. Human rights abuses, forced mobilization of men into the Russian armed forces and pro-Moscow indoctrination of children in schools are rampant, Tolokonnikov said.
In the event of a ceasefire that leaves Kherson split, “we will not be able to simply move on,” he said. “This issue must be resolved and our people on the east bank must be liberated.”
“The liberation of our territories is possible,” Tolokonnikov added, noting that many people were skeptical that Ukrainian forces could free the territory ultimately liberated during the 2022 southern counteroffensive. Still, he acknowledged Kherson’s full liberation may prove a long-term aspiration. “It’s important to remain realistic and not create false expectations for people,” he said.
The sounds of eventual victory, Tolokonnikov said, might be heard in the echoes of an earlier chapter of Ukrainian history. The Soviet Union, he said, “was even more powerful than Russia is today. Eventually, countries still broke free from its control.”