Melania Trump and Pope Leo Credited With Humanitarian Ceasefire for Ukraine's Oleshky

Russia and Ukraine have agreed to a temporary ceasefire in the Russian-occupied city of Oleshky, the White House announced on Friday, crediting Melania Trump with securing the arrangement. The truce is meant to let humanitarian aid reach residents who have reported a worsening food crisis. The White House said it is due to begin on Oct. 29.

According to a White House statement, both countries agreed to temporarily stop all military action in the city so aid can enter and a civilian evacuation can be prepared along a designated safe passage. The statement said Melania Trump and her representative worked directly with Russian and Ukrainian leadership to set the terms of the localized truce.

"The situation in Oleshky is dire," Melania Trump said in the statement, describing a front-line city on the brink of disaster. She said the remaining population is mostly elderly people who urgently need medical attention, medicine, food and clean water.

Under the deal, non-military teams from both countries will visit residents in their homes and help arrange transport for anyone who wants to leave for either Russia or Ukraine. The White House said Oleshky, which sits across the Dnipro River from Kherson, now has between 1,700 and 2,000 residents, including about 50 children. Before the war the population was roughly 24,000. The White House also said about 90 per cent of the city was flooded after the Kakhovka Dam was destroyed.

Ukraine's top negotiator, David Arakhamia, wrote on Telegram that the humanitarian operation would start once the ceasefire takes hold. He said the accord followed a long process involving both Melania Trump and Pope Leo, and would create a corridor for people to leave and for assistance to come in.

The Kremlin said an evacuation would take at least a few days. It praised Melania Trump and said work was under way to ease conditions in Oleshky after Russian President Vladimir Putin told Pope Leo he was ready to co-operate on the issue. The two reportedly spoke by telephone last week. Russian Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov said Russian forces will stop firing from 4 a.m. local time on Oct. 27 to support the operation.

Separately, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said negotiators from Ukraine, Russia and the United States agreed to hold technical-level talks in Abu Dhabi in the first half of November. He told the Hudson Institute he had spoken with U.S. envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff after their meeting with Putin earlier in the week. Zelenskyy said any peace deal would need strong security guarantees and 10 years of funding for Ukraine's army.

The announcements follow two weeks of criticism from European allies, Democrats and some Republicans over U.S. involvement in the war. President Donald Trump struck a deal with Putin to import diesel and later announced a ceasefire on energy attacks, though Russia showed no sign of halting its fire. On Oct. 14, Zelenskyy said SpaceX had restricted Starlink service, which Ukrainian officials say hampers strikes and drone defence.

Fighting continued on Friday. Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport briefly suspended operations because of a Ukrainian drone threat, and Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said air defences downed 21 drones headed for the capital over two hours. The two sides also exchanged 270 prisoners each. Ukraine's acting prosecutor general, Anton Kovalskyi, said more than 19,000 Ukrainian civilians, including 762 children, have been killed since the full-scale invasion began.