“They tell us Russia has done a lot for us. But all I notice is that I don’t have enough money to live like I did before. Before, I didn’t just have a good life, I had a wonderful life. Now I’m struggling to get by.”
Oksana* is from the settlement of Novoaidar, some 60 kilometers (37 miles) northwest of the regional capital, Luhansk, which has been occupied since 2014.
Soon after Russia launched its full-scale invasion in the spring of 2022, the Russian army also captured Novoaidar, as well as the cities of Lysychansk, Sievierodonetsk and Rubizhne, and took control of almost all of the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk.
Since then, the population of Novoaidar has shrunk by a third.
“Only older people have stayed. The young ones have fled to other parts of Ukraine, or abroad. The only place you see young people these days is in Luhansk,” said Oksana.
She told DW that her village is suffering because of the war.
Her house is one of many that have been damaged by shelling, but the occupying authorities haven’t provided any help for reconstruction.
Bartering with neighbors for food
Before the Russian invasion, Oksana, who cares for her elderly father, sold her own homegrown food.
Now she no longer has livestock, and she’s not permitted to sell vegetables, either.
To do this, she would have to register a company according to Russian law.
“We just grow vegetables for ourselves now, and barter with our neighbors,” she said.
Oksana estimates that you need to earn at least 40,000 rubles a month (around €440/$500) to lead a normal life here.
Many of the villagers — the postmen, for example — earn less than €200.
The jobs on offer in local social media groups are mostly in either the service industry or construction.
In nearby Sievierodonetsk, jobs for “workers with plumbing skills” are advertised at a salary of 120,000 rubles (€1,320).
The Alchevsk iron and steel works also pays well. There are also often posts on social media promoting contracts with the Russian army, for which the pay is 216,000 rubles (€2,376).
Like many residents of the occupied territories, Oksana’s father still draws a Ukrainian pension.
To do so, he has to use a VPN (virtual private network) to access the web portal of the Ukrainian pensions office, which has been blocked by the occupying forces.
“Without this pension, you can’t survive,” said Oksana.
Her father receives the equivalent of €61 a month. “That’s enough to buy cheap food for a week,” said Oksana.
She has to supplement her father’s minimum basic pension by using her family’s savings.
She complained that food prices have risen, and that there are only two shops left in Novoaidar.
“In Luhansk, you can buy a dozen eggs for less than half the price,” she said. That’s why she makes the trip there every two weeks to go shopping.
She’s also been to Sievierodonetsk and Starobilsk.
“But those cities are completely destroyed,” she said. “On TV, they say that almost everything there has been rebuilt, but you still see burnt-out houses with no windows, doors or roofs.”
People there are still waiting for new windows and doors.
No power, no water, no internet
The Ukrainian regional administration for Luhansk, which was evacuated to territory controlled by Kyiv, relies mainly on social media for information about the problems faced by people in the occupied zones.
People post online about power cuts, and water being cut off. “In summer, it regularly happens in Sievierodonetsk that there’s neither electricity nor water, at the same time,” Oleksii Kharchenko, the governor of the Luhansk region, told DW.
“The water supply has supposedly been turned off for repairs to electrical equipment, and the electricity supposedly because of work on the pumping stations.”
When there’s no electricity, there’s no internet. And according to Oksana, the cellphone provider Lugacom, which covers the occupied region of Luhansk, offers very poor reception.
It’s hard even to open Instant Messenger, she said. A lot of websites are blocked, as well: “You even have to use a VPN to get onto [messaging app] Viber.”
In this regard, at least, Kharchenko is able to offer some hope.
“Right now, Telegram is testing a chatbot that’s been developed primarily for communication with people living in the occupied territories,” he said.
Kharchenko reported that people also complain on social media that there aren’t enough doctors, even in the cities.
Oksana told DW that a group of doctors from the Russian cities of Krasnodar, St. Petersburg and Moscow come to Novoaidar once a year.
“They treat people in a particular district for one month, and after that you have to see local doctors again. But when you go to the outpatient department, they say there aren’t any doctors there. Your only option is to borrow money and pay to see a doctor privately,” Oksana said.
She also said that hospitals won’t treat patients without Russian passports.
Pressure to become Russian citizens
Since the start of 2025, people who live in the occupied territories and who haven’t taken Russian citizenship are considered by Russia to be either foreigners or stateless, said Kharchenko.
“This means they’re denied all social security benefits and allowances, and also the right to medical treatment,” he added.
But acquiring Russian citizenship also makes them eligible for conscription.
“When it became apparent that most people were trying to avoid getting a Russian passport, not least in order to escape mobilization, the occupiers started to introduce more and more restrictions. They’re creating conditions that force people to get a Russian passport,” explained Kharchenko.
For example, he said that, in March, the occupying authorities started confiscating the houses and apartments of people who had left Luhansk.
“According to Russian law, housing that has been inventoried and declared ‘not belonging to anyone’ is transferred by the courts to communal ownership,” he said.
To make sure this didn’t happen to her, Oksana had to obtain Russian papers for her house.
Kharchenko said the new rules are another means of putting pressure on people in the occupied territories who reject Russian citizenship.
Some are even returning to the occupied territories just to hold on to their properties.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has issued a decree stating that all those who do not have Russian citizenship must leave the occupied territories by September 10.
In spite of this, Oksana intends to stay in Novoaidar and see what happens.
“Why should I go begging somewhere else when I have everything here?” she said.
“We’re waiting for things to be like before. That’s the attitude of most people here.”
This article was originally written in Ukrainian.
*Name changed for security reasons
