Utility companies in Kherson were working to restore critical infrastructure mined by fleeing Russian forces, with most homes in the southern Ukrainian city still without electricity and water, regional officials said on Sunday.

The governor of Kherson region, Yaroslav Yanushevych, said the authorities had decided to maintain a curfew from 5pm to 8am and ban people from leaving or entering the city, as a security measure.

“The enemy mined all critical infrastructure objects,” Yanushevych told Ukrainian TV. “We are trying to meet within a few days and (then) open the city,” he said, adding that he hoped mobile phone operators could start working on Sunday.

Ukrainian troops arrived in the centre of Kherson on Friday after Russia abandoned the only regional capital it had captured since its war began in February.

The head of Ukrainian state railways said train service to Kherson was expected to resume this week.

Another regional official, however, said that while mine clearance was underway and authorities were working to restore critical services, in humanitarian terms the situation in the city “remains very difficult”.

“Most houses have no electricity, no water and problems with gas supplies,” Yuriy Sobolevskiy, first deputy chairman of Kherson regional council, told Ukrainian TV.

While jubilant residents welcomed arriving troops in Kherson, Ukraine’s general staff reported continued fierce fighting along the eastern front in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

Over the past 24 hours, its forces repelled Russian attacks along several settlements in both regions, it said in its morning update, while reporting Russian rocket and artillery fire in the eastern areas of Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Novopavlivka and Zaporizhzhia.

President Volodymyr Zelensky credited Ukraine’s success in Kherson and elsewhere in part to stiff resistance in the Donetsk region, despite repeated Russian attacks.

“There it is just hell — there are extremely fierce battles there every day,” he said in his regular evening video address on Saturday.

Hundreds of residents lined the streets of Kherson on Saturday waving national flags, chanting “thank you, thank you” and decorating Ukrainian servicemen with blue and yellow ribbons.

“It is impossible to express in words what I feel now. Never in my life before had I felt such joy as now,” Kherson resident Natalia Koloba said. “Our brothers, our protectors have come and we are free today. This is unbelievable.”