In liberated Ukraine town, locals sob with relief, relate harrowing accounts

BALAKLIIA, Ukraine — The guns had gone quiet after three days of fighting in the battle-scarred northeast Ukrainian town of Balakliia, but Mariya Tymofiyeva said it was only when she saw Ukrainian soldiers that it hit her that over six months of Russian occupation had ended.

“I was walking away… when I saw an armored personnel carrier coming onto the square with a Ukrainian flag: my heart just tightened up and I began to sob,” the 43-year-old resident said, her voice trembling with emotion.

On Tuesday, she was among a crowd of residents receiving food parcels from a van at the same square where the Ukrainian flag was dramatically hoisted last week in one of the fir…

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