Kozinka looks like any other village in Russia’s Belgorod region. Brick houses, a school and a kindergarten, and a grocery store with opening hours posted on the door. But the houses are dark, and the shop never opens.
The village, located less than one kilometer from the border with Ukraine, was closed by authorities last year. Of the roughly 1,000 residents who once lived there, fewer than ten remain today, staying at their own risk.
Authorities promised compensation to evacuees for their homes, but most are still waiting. Ukrainian forces entered Kozinka twice, in 2023 and 2024. Part of the village was destroyed during the fighting, but according to the remaining residents, civilians were not targeted.
Alexandra Severina, an 87-year-old former resident, recalls with a faint smile the Ukrainian soldiers who entered the village in armored vehicles. They confiscated mobile phones but left them piled under a tree so residents could retrieve them after the troops withdrew.
“We always lived in harmony with Ukrainians. They are good people,” says Katerina Matveyevna, one of the few who remain in what is left of Kozinka. Like most residents of the border areas, she speaks surzhyk—a mix of Russian and Ukrainian—and has friends and relatives across the border.
In the past, they sang Christmas carols together and crossed the border to shop: sausages were cheaper in Ukraine, while gasoline was cheaper in Russia.
Belgorod Region Under Strain
Today, the border is monitored by drones. “If it’s Ukrainian, it buzzes like a mosquito; if it’s Russian, it buzzes like a bee,” says Nikolai, who transports people between Kozinka and the city of Belgorod, the regional capital about 40 kilometers away.
Over the past four years, residents of Belgorod—a city that once had around 400,000 inhabitants and now noticeably fewer—have grown accustomed to the realities of war. But since early January, when Ukrainian missiles struck the city’s power plant, the region has faced the risk of electricity outages.
Power and heating supplies have largely been restored, but reserves are insufficient to meet everyone’s needs, according to regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov.
On January 13, Gladkov warned that the city could be evacuated in the event of a complete power outage. The warning triggered strong reactions in Russian media, but for local residents, life continued almost normally. People still go to work every morning and often ignore air-raid sirens.
In fact, Belgorod appears livelier than it did two years ago, when it was hit by Ukrainian rockets in retaliation for Russian strikes on Kharkiv and other Ukrainian cities.
Near the site where 25 people were killed, an improvised memorial of toys and flowers has been erected. Yet many residents’ concerns go beyond airstrikes, extending to recent policies by local authorities.
On January 12, Governor Gladkov declared a campaign against “internal enemies” and those he claims are “sowing discontent.”
In this climate of uncertainty, people are unsure whether describing everyday hardships near the front line could be considered an act of dissent, so most prefer to remain silent.
A preliminary list of those accused of “spreading panic” includes social media groups discussing residents’ problems, as well as Pepel, a Telegram news channel with around 100,000 followers run by Nikita Parmenov, a journalist from Belgorod now living in exile who relies on contributions from local residents.
Authorities’ anger toward the channel is less about its content and more about its role in coordinating volunteers who distribute water and aid to damaged homes. Grassroots initiatives are viewed with suspicion by the authorities, who have attempted to replace them with an official “volunteer program,” reports The Economist.
Meanwhile, the government is trying to portray Belgorod as a heroic frontline city. A photo exhibition in the city’s main park shows soldiers defending the homeland. Few passersby stop to look.
“Everyone is tired,” says one resident, hiding his face.
“Many of those who supported the war at the beginning are now disillusioned.”
Growing Disillusionment
This sentiment is echoed by a January survey conducted by the local outlet Fonar. About one quarter of respondents said they felt “exhausted and disappointed,” while a similar proportion described their lives as frozen in limbo. Only 6 percent said they had helped participants in what Russia calls its “special military operation.”
Ilya Kostyukov, a political activist and lawyer in Belgorod, says many soldiers seek his legal assistance in hopes of terminating their military contracts. According to him, for more than a year, even wounded soldiers have not been allowed to leave service.
“I tell them honestly: you can bang your head against the wall and pay me millions, but we won’t succeed,” he says.
