Pope Leo XIV calls Zelensky over Oleshky humanitarian crisis and truce request

The call with Zelensky

Pope Leo XIV spoke by telephone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday, 19 October, according to a statement from the Vatican press office. The pontiff raised the grave situation in Oleshky, a city in Ukraine's Kherson region that Russian forces occupy, and referred to the humanitarian truce he had already requested from Russian President Vladimir Putin. The Holy See said the Pope hoped that cooperation between the two sides could bring food and medical aid into the city and allow civilians to leave voluntarily and safely.

Today, Pope Leo XIV held a telephone conversation with Volodymyr Zelensky, President of Ukraine.

The earlier call with Putin

The Pope had called Putin on Friday, 16 October, asking for a truce in Oleshky so aid could reach the town and residents could get out. The Vatican said he voiced deep concern over what it described as a grave humanitarian collapse there. That call took place while the Pope was in hospital, and afterwards the Kremlin said Putin had wished him a speedy recovery and blamed Ukraine for the difficult humanitarian situation in the town. Zelensky wished the Pope a full and rapid recovery after surgery for a malignant lung tumour and thanked him for remembering Ukraine in prayer. Zelensky wrote on X that he had briefed the Pope on Russia's escalating attacks on Ukrainian cities and communities, and on partners sometimes failing to give warning of Russian ballistic missile strikes. Europa Press counts five meetings or calls since the first conversation on 12 May 2025, four days after the conclave that elected Leo XIV.

Conditions in Oleshky

About 2,000 people remain trapped in Oleshky, which lies on the left bank of the Dnipro across from Kherson, without electricity, gas or a safe way out. The Kherson Regional Military Administration said that at the end of September about 2,000 people were still blockaded there, almost 50 of them children, and that deliveries of food and medicine had been impossible for a month. Ukrainian troops have been dropping food by drone since March, and aid packages have reached 100 locations after dark, including flour, pasta, tinned food, painkillers and water-purification tablets. The regional head, Oleksandr Prokudin, said residents were being forced to survive without food, electricity or water.

Most horrifyingly, the Russians have effectively deprived them of any possibility of escaping this hell.

Prokudin also accused Russian forces of obstructing aid, destroying vehicles used for deliveries and killing people who tried to bring in food and medicine. Authorities had received reports that civilians who collected food were detained, badly beaten and held in makeshift cells.

Evacuation talks and a strike in Kharkiv

Ukraine's human rights commissioner, Dmytro Lubinets, said Russia had reportedly accepted the proposals for a humanitarian corridor, but that final details still had to be agreed and some difficult issues remained open. Italian press reports said Moscow and Kyiv were settling the last details to evacuate thousands of civilians, including 200 children, from seven localities in the region. Destroyed bridges, mined roads and the absence of safe corridors currently keep residents from leaving. Separately, Zelensky said on X that a Shahed missile hit a playground in Kharkiv region where families were present in the afternoon, killing at least six people, three of them children, and injuring 14, including six children. No final evacuation agreement has been confirmed yet.