- Russia occupied the Ukrainian city of Kherson for eight months before retreating in November.
- But Russian troops left traps behind that Ukrainian demining squads are trying to disarm.
Russian forces retreated from the Ukrainian city of Kherson last month, dealing a major blow to President Vladimir Putin's war efforts, but marks of the eight-month occupation remain.
Kherson, a regional capital, was the first major Ukrainian city seized by Russian forces after the invasion in February. The southern port city was occupied from March until November, when Russian officials announced a retreat and Ukrainian forces returned.
Since the retreat, which revealed stories of potential war crimes and Ukrainian resistance, Russian forces have continued shelling the Kherson region. Ukrainian officials have also helped some residents evacuate the liberated city ahead of winter as its power infrastructure has yet to fully recover from the battering.
But residents on the ground are dealing with another consequence of the Russian occupation — booby traps.
According to The Associated Press, the traps included a street sign that read "Mines Ahead" and directed people away from a main road and onto a side road — but it was the side road that contained a minefield. Several Ukrainian service members and police were killed at the location.
"To give you an idea, during the month of our work, we found and removed several tons of mines," a Ukrainian service member on a demining squad told AP, adding that the mines were spread across nearly 4 square miles.
Demining squads are still working to clear the city of traps left by Russians, like explosives left in potholes or buried in soil, but the freezing winter is making the work more difficult.
Traps other than land mines have also been set: At one of two police stations in the city that Ukrainian authorities said Russia used as torture chambers, there were so many booby traps that crews tasked with disarming weapons have not been able to enter, AP reported. And at a civilian residence, a hand grenade had been fastened to a laundry machine so that when the detergent tray was opened, it would explode.