Russia and Ukraine begin local ceasefire around Oleshky for aid and evacuations from 6am PKT

Russia and Ukraine began a localised ceasefire around Oleshky at 4am Moscow time on Tuesday 27 October (6am in Pakistan), to allow a humanitarian operation in the Russian-held town on the Dnipro river, Reuters reported via Business Recorder.

What has been agreed

• Where: Oleshky, a town on the eastern bank of the Dnipro in Ukraine's Kherson region, opposite Kherson city, which Ukraine holds. Russian forces took it in the first days of the February 2022 invasion.
• When: from 0100 GMT on 27 October. No end time has been made public.
• Why: to deliver food and medicine and evacuate civilians from a frontline town facing acute shortages.
• Who confirmed it: Russia's defence ministry, on Telegram, said it had stopped shelling in the direction of Kherson. Ukraine's human rights commissioner Dmytro Lubinets, who leads the Ukrainian negotiating team, said on Facebook that Kyiv was honouring its commitments.

The White House said last week that US First Lady Melania Trump had helped secure the arrangement.

Fighting goes on elsewhere

The pause is limited to the Oleshky area. A Russian missile attack on Kyiv on Monday killed at least one person and injured 10, including students in a dormitory, and people were killed and wounded in Kharkiv and Pavlohrad. A Reuters witness reported new explosions in Kyiv on Tuesday morning.

Why it matters here

Local humanitarian pauses are rare in this war, and any step toward de-escalation is watched by markets: the conflict has kept pressure on global grain and fuel prices, which feed into what Pakistanis pay at the pump. Follow the daily changes on our petrol price page and the PSO ex-depot price data.