C T Online Desk: At least 20 civilians including several children were able to leave a badly battered steel plant in the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol on Saturday in what could be the start of a long-awaited, larger evacuation of the last holdout in the Russian-held city.
Earlier efforts at evacuations from the Azovstal steel plant — where local fighters say they and hundreds of civilians are still sheltering in brutal conditions — had been futile.
Ukrainian fighters of the Azov regiment, which has been defending the site, said 20 civilians had left, possibly for the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, about 225 kilometres (140 miles) to the northwest.
Russia’s Tass news agency carried a similar report, though putting the number of evacuees at 25.
A United Nations-planned evacuation had been planned, though it was unclear whether Saturday’s evacuation was UN-led and whether further evacuations were imminent. There were no immediate details on the condition of the evacuees.
Ukraine’s President Zelensky said in a video Saturday evening said Kyiv was “doing everything to ensure that the evacuation mission from Mariupol is carried out”.
Fresh satellite imagery by private US firm Maxar taken on Friday showed a devastated Mariupol, with almost all of Azovstal destroyed.
The apparent ceasefire in Mariupol took place as Russian attacks continued unabated across Ukraine, most heavily in the fiercely disputed eastern regions, but with attacks as far west as Odessa, on the Black Sea coast.
Odessa’s regional governor Maxim Marchenko said a Russian missile strike had destroyed the airport runway, as Moscow continues targeting infrastructure and supply lines deep in the west of the country.
There were no victims from the airport strike near the historic city of one million people.
Near Bucha, the town near Kyiv that has become synonymous with allegations of Russian war crimes, Ukrainian police on Saturday reported finding three bodies shot in the head with their hands tied.The three bodies found in a pit were “brutally killed” by Russian soldiers — each shot in the head, the police said in a statement.
“The victims’ hands were tied, cloths were covering their eyes and some were gagged. There are traces of torture on the corpses,” it said.
– Clearing debris –
In Mariupol, the Azov regiment said Saturday that it had been clearing the debris of overnight shelling by Russia to rescue trapped civilians.
From the city’s badly damaged port zone, AFP on Friday heard heavy shelling coming from Azovstal during a media trip organised by the Russian army, with explosions only seconds apart.
“Twenty civilians, women and children… have been transferred to a suitable place and we hope that they will be evacuated to Zaporizhzhia, on territory controlled by Ukraine,” said Sviatoslav Palamar, deputy commander of the Azov regiment.
But Denis Pushilin, leader of the breakaway eastern region of Donetsk, accused Ukrainian forces of “acting like outright terrorists” and holding civilians hostage in the steel plant.
