Hundreds of residents decided to stay back in the village, though many others fled after two months of war. The last ones to remain are the poorest and most vulnerable, often the oldest, and those whose only riches come from the earth
Vasili Kushch walks through a farmyard amid the sound of regular nearby shelling, in the village of Mala Tokmatchka which he refuses to leave saying he has nowhere to go and that no one will take him because he is a farm worker, near the southern front of fighting between Ukrainian and Russian forces, south of Zaporizhzhia on April 23, 2022. (Credit: Ed JONES / AFP)