Ukraine says all women, children, elderly evacuated from besieged Mariupol steel mill
Global News
The Mariupol steel mill has been bombarded by intense fighting that continues to escalate. Russia is pushing ahead of what it marks as 'Victory Day' on May 9.
Ukraine’s deputy prime minister says all women, children and elderly have been evacuated from a Mariupol steel mill long besieged by Russian forces.
Iryna Vereshchuk made the announcement on Saturday.
She said: “The president’s order has been carried out: all women, children and the elderly have been evacuated from Azovstal. This part of the Mariupol humanitarian operation has been completed.”
She did not elaborate. The Russian news agency Tass had reported that 50 civilians were evacuated from the plant on Saturday. A similar number left on Friday.
The civilians had been holding up in the plant with Ukrainian fighters making a final stand to prevent a complete takeover of Mariupol.
The war in Ukraine wracked the country’s southern coast Saturday as Russian forces fired cruise missiles at the city of Odesa and bombarded a steel mill housing Ukrainian civilians and fighters, hoping to complete their conquest of the port of Mariupol in time for Victory Day celebrations.
However, in a sign of the unexpectedly effective defence that has sustained the fighting into its 11th week, Ukraine’s military flattened Russian positions on a Black Sea island that was captured in the war’s first days and has become a symbol of Ukrainian resistance.
Western military analysts said a Ukrainian counter-offensive also was advancing around the nation’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, even as it remained a key target of Russian shelling. The Ukrainian army said it retook control of five villages and part of a sixth near hotly contested Kharkiv.