Ukrainian authorities are planning to evacuate more civilians from Mariupol on Monday, after dozens were finally brought to safety following weeks trapped under heavy fire in the strategic port city’s Azovstal steel complex.
The civilians had been sheltering in bunkers beneath the steelworks that is the last redoubt for Ukrainian forces in Mariupol.
On Sunday, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said about 100 civilians evacuated from the steel works and would arrive in the Ukrainian-controlled city of Zaporizhzhia on Monday morning.
“For the first time, we had two days of a ceasefire on this territory, and we managed to take out more than 100 civilians - women, children,” Zelenskiy said in a nightly video address. He said he hoped evacuations would resume on Monday at 8am local time (0500 GMT). The head of the Donetsk Regional Military Administration later said the evacuation would begin at 7am (0400 GMT).
As many as 100,000 people are believed to be in the blockaded city, which has endured some of the most terrible suffering of the Russian invasion. These include 1,000 civilians and 2,000 Ukrainian fighters thought to be sheltering underneath the Soviet-era steelworks, the only part of the ruined city not taken by Russian forces.
After enduring a vicious weeks-long siege that forced people into confinement in basements, without food, water, heat or electricity, Russian forces closed in, leaving the steelworks as the last remaining stronghold. Vladimir Putin decided not to storm the plant, but called on Russian troops to blockade the area “so that a fly can’t get through”.
The UN confirmed on Sunday that a “safe-passage operation” to evacuate civilians had begun, in coordination with the International Committee of the Red Cross, Ukraine and Russia, but declined to give further details in order to protect people.
Zelenskiy’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak suggested the evacuations could go further than just the civilians holed up in the steelworks. “This is just the first step, and we will continue to take our civilians and troops out of Mariupol,” he wrote on Telegram.
Earlier, Reuters reported that more than 50 civilians in separate groups had arrived from the plant on Sunday in Bezimenne, a village about 20 miles (33km) east of Mariupol in territory controlled by Russian-backed separatists. The group arrived in buses with Ukrainian number plates as part of a convoy with Russian forces and vehicles with UN symbols.
An evacuee in Bezimenne, Natalia Usmanova, 37, told Reuters she had been so terrified as Russian bombs rained down on the plant sprinkling her with concrete dust that she felt her heart would stop.
“When the bunker started to shake, I was hysterical. My husband can vouch for that. I was so worried the bunker would cave in,” she said. “We didn’t see the sun for so long… You just can’t imagine what we have been through - the terror.”
Photograph: Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters
Russia’s defence ministry said on Sunday that 80 people, including women and children, had left the Azovstal works, according to the state news agency Ria Novosti.
Russian forces have obliterated the port city of Mariupol, a major target for Moscow because of its strategic location near Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014.
In other developments:
Two explosions were reported in the early hours of Monday in Belgorod, the southern Russian region bordering Ukraine. Vyacheslav Gladkov, the region’s governor, said in a social media post there were no casualties or damage. On Sunday Gladkov had said one person was injured in a fire at a Russian defence ministry facility in Belgorod, while seven homes had been damaged.
Russia’s top uniformed officer, General Valery Gerasimov, visited dangerous frontline positions in eastern Ukraine last week in a bid to reinvigorate the Russian offensive there, the New York Times has reported citing Ukrainian and US officials. The Guardian could not immediately confirm the report.
Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said that the county is working to prevent nuclear war, Reuters reported. In an interview with Italian TV, Lavrov said: “Western media misrepresent Russian threats. Russia has never interrupted efforts to reach agreements that guarantee that a nuclear war never develops”.
News of the Azovstal steel plant evacuations came as the US House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, met Zelenskiy in Kyiv, where she pledged enduring support for his country’s “fight for freedom”. Pelosi, whose visit was not announced beforehand, is the highest-level US official to meet the Ukrainian president since the war began.
“We are visiting you to say thank you for your fight for freedom,” she said in video footage released on Zelenskiy’s Twitter account. “And that your fight is a fight for everyone, and so our commitment is to be there for you until the fight is done.”
Speaking at a press conference in Poland on Sunday, Pelosi said the US would hold its resolve, after being asked whether Washington was concerned about its support provoking a Russian reaction. “Let me speak for myself: do not be bullied by bullies,” she said. “If they are making threats, you cannot back down.”
Last week Joe Biden called for a $33bn (£26bn) package of military, humanitarian and economic support for Ukraine, more than doubling the level of US assistance to date.
While the US is increasing support for Ukraine, Germany’s chancellor rejected criticism that Berlin was not doing enough. In an interview with Bild am Sonntag, Olaf Scholz said he took decisions “fast and in concert with our partners”.
Meanwhile it emerged that the EU is looking at banning Russian oil imports from the end of 2022, in the latest effort to cut funds to Vladimir Putin’s war machine.
Russia continued its refigured campaign to seize parts of southern and eastern Ukraine, after failing to take Kyiv. On Sunday, Russia’s defence ministry said it had attacked an airfield near Odesa and claimed to have destroyed a hangar that contained weapons provided by foreign countries.
Meanwhile, the governor of Kharkiv warned residents on Sunday not to leave shelters because of “intense shelling”. Oleh Synyehubov asked residents in the north and eastern districts of the city, especially Saltivka, not to leave their shelters unless it was urgent.
Associated Press and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report.
