A mannequin in a Ukrainian border guard uniform and a green beret low on its forehead is tied to the side rail of a 17-metre-high watchtower, facing Russia. Strong wind rocks the structure. On the ground, border guards patrol the area along a two-metre-high green fence crowned with a barbed wire.
Back in September 2014, Ukraine's then Prime Minister Arseniy Petrovych Yatsenyuk announced a plan to fortify Ukraine's border with Russia.
Dubbed "Project Wall", it carried the promise of a new beginning for post-Euromaidan Ukraine, caught in a war with the Russian-backed separatists in Donbas.
But a corruption scandal has put the project under question. So far, just 15 percent of the wall has been built and it is unlikely to be completed by the end of 2018.
Last August and November, eight people from the border guard and local contractors from Kharkiv were detained on corruption charges.
In February 2018, several servicemen of the border guard, including the deputy of the Kharkiv border detachment and the head of the office of rapid responses, were also arrested. It is yet unconfirmed if their detention was related to Project Wall.