ORIKHIV, Ukraine—Only three people remain in a nine-story block of 146 apartments in this front-line city of southern Ukraine. For the past several months, they have been living in a basement, using a small generator because daily Russian shelling has long disrupted electric supplies to Orikhiv. Despite all that, Vitaliy Pilyay, one of the basement’s three dwellers, was in a good mood on a recent day. Ukrainian forces are preparing a counteroffensive, possibly aiming to oust Russia from this part of the country, and he said he was confident that the end of Orikhiv’s yearlong ordeal is near.

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