The United Nations has been working to mediate the evacuation of up to 1,000 civilians living under the extensive Soviet-era factory in Azovstal after several previous attempts failed. Ukraine did not say how many fighters were also at the plant, the only part of Mariupol not occupied by Russian forces, but Russia put the number at about 2,000. An estimated 100,000 civilians remain in the city. UN humanitarian spokesman Saviano Abreu said the world body was in talks with authorities in Moscow and Kyiv, but could not provide details on the ongoing evacuation effort “due to the complexity and liquidity of the operation”. “There are, at the moment, ongoing high-level commitments with all governments, Russia and Ukraine, to make sure you can save civilians and support the evacuation of civilians from the factory,” Abreu told the AP. He did not confirm the video posted on social media that allegedly shows UN-marked vehicles in Mariupol. Ukraine has blamed the failure of several previous evacuation attempts on the ongoing Russian bombing. In the city of Lyman in the Donetsk region, where at least half the population has fled the Russian bombing, about 20 elderly people and children carrying bags with their dogs and cats boarded a minivan marked “children evacuated” in Ukrainian. . He rushed to the city of Dnipro as explosions were heard from afar. “The liberators came and set us free from what? Our lives? “Said Nina Mihaylenko, a professor of Russian language and literature, referring to Russian forces. Galina Zuev and her husband Aleksander chose to stay, reluctant to leave the place they had spent their whole lives. The story goes on “I do not live that well. There is a war going on here. They bomb all the time. The windows in our house are broken. “The rockets are in the courtyards,” said Galina, 68. “It’s scary”. Russian forces have launched a major military operation to occupy key parts of southern and eastern Ukraine, the industrial heart of the country. Ukrainian forces fought village after village on Saturday to contain the Russian advance. Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency reported on Saturday that 19 adults and six children had been pulled from the steel plant, but gave no further details. A senior official of the Azov Regiment, the Ukrainian unit defending the plant, said 20 civilians had been evacuated during the ceasefire, although it was unclear if he was referring to the same group. There was no confirmation from the UN “These are women and children,” Sviatoslav Palamar said in a video posted on the constitution’s Telegram channel. He also called for the evacuation of the injured: “We do not know why they are not being evacuated and their evacuation is not being discussed in the territory controlled by Ukraine.” Videos and images from inside the factory, shared with the Associated Press by two Ukrainians who said their husbands were among the fighters refusing to surrender there, show unknown men with stained bandages. others had open wounds or amputated limbs. Skeleton medical staff treated at least 600 wounded, the women said, who identified their husbands as members of Ukraine’s Azov National Guard Regiment. Some of the wounds were rotting with gangrene, they said. In the video, the men said they only ate once a day and distributed just 1.5 liters (50 ounces) of water a day to four people and that supplies inside the besieged facilities were running low. A man without a shirt seemed to be in pain as he described his injuries: two broken ribs, a punctured lung and a dislocated arm “hanging in the flesh”. “I want to say to everyone who sees this: If you do not stop here in Ukraine, it will go further, in Europe,” he said. The AP could not independently verify the date and location of the video, which the women said was taken last week in the maze of corridors and warehouses under the factory. The women urged the evacuation of the Ukrainian fighters along with the civilians, warning that they could be tortured and executed if arrested. “The lives of soldiers are also important,” Yulia Fedusic told the AP in Rome. In a video overnight late Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky changed his mind to urge Russian troops not to fight in Ukraine, saying even their generals expected thousands more to die. The president accused Moscow of recruiting new soldiers “with little motivation and little combat experience” so that units that broke out at the start of the war could be thrown back into battle. “Every Russian soldier can still save his life,” Zelensky said. “It is better to survive in Russia than to get lost in our land.” In other developments: – Ukrainian Deputy Agriculture Minister Taras Vysotsky said in a televised statement that Russian forces had seized hundreds of thousands of tons of grain in areas under their control. Ukraine is a major producer of grain and the invasion has boosted world prices and raised concerns about shortages. “A Russian rocket attack destroyed the runway at Odessa Airport, Ukraine’s third most populous city and a major Black Sea port,” the Ukrainian military said. – The bodies of three men were found buried in a forest near the Bucha suburb of Kiev, said the head of the police force of the Kiev region. The men, whose bodies were found on Friday, were tortured before being shot in the head, Andriy Nebytov wrote on Facebook. Ukrainian officials have claimed that retreating Russian troops carried out mass killings of civilians in Bucha. – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in an interview that Russian and Ukrainian negotiators talk “almost every day.” However, he told China’s state-run Xinhua news agency, “progress has not been easy.” – Two buses sent to evacuate residents from the eastern town of Popasna came under fire and contact with organizers was lost. “We know that (the buses) arrived in the city and then came under fire from an enemy sabotage and reconnaissance team,” said Mayor Nikolai Hanatov. It was difficult to get a full picture of the unfolding battle in eastern Ukraine, as airstrikes and artillery barricades have made the circulation of journalists extremely dangerous. Both Ukraine and Moscow-backed rebels have also imposed severe restrictions on reports from the battle zone. However, Western military analysts have suggested that the attack in the Donbas area, which includes Mariupol, was proceeding much more slowly than planned. So far, Russian troops and separatists appear to have made only small gains in the month since Moscow said it would focus its military power on the east. Numerically, Russia’s military manpower far exceeds that of Ukraine. In the days before the start of the war, Western intelligence estimated that Russia had deployed up to 190,000 troops near the border. Ukraine’s permanent army totals about 200,000, spread across the country. With ample firepower still in reserve, Russia’s attack could still intensify and overwhelm the Ukrainians. In total, the Russian army has about 900,000 active-duty personnel. Russia also has a much larger air force and navy. Hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid have flowed into Ukraine since the start of the war, but Russia’s huge arsenal means Ukraine will continue to demand huge amounts of support.
Fisch reported from Sloviansk. Associated Press reporters Jon Gambrell and Yuras Karmanau in Lviv, Mstyslav Chernov in Kharkiv, Lolita C. Baldor in Washington, Trisha Thompson in Rome and AP staff around the world contributed to this report.
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