Mariupol residents, mainly under the control of the Russian army, are hoping that on Monday they will be evacuated from their city that was devastated on Monday, as well as dozens of their compatriots over the weekend.
However, hope diminishes as time goes on. Buses expected at 7 a.m. local time (midnight EST) are still not arriving at the agreed meeting point by noon, the city council said, without providing further details.
The civilians wishing to leave Mariupol on Monday are not the ones still buried in the underground galleries of the massive Azovstal metallurgical complex, in the company of the last Ukrainian fighters.
More than 100 people who were there were evacuated over the weekend, according to Ukrainian authorities, but they still have not reached Zaporizhia, a Ukrainian-controlled town 250 km northwest of Mariupol.
This evacuation, which had nothing to do with armed fighters, was carried out thanks to an agreement between kyiv and Moscow, in collaboration with the International Committee of the Red Cross and the United Nations.
The possibility that this relief operation will continue on Monday seems small, the Ukrainian authorities have announced that Russian bombings of the complex will continue once the evacuations are completed.
In Zaporijia, two armored 4x4s from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) are waiting to help them in a parking lot that has been turned into a reception center for these refugees.
Many journalists who wanted to hear them testify about their living conditions in the bunkers of Azovstal were also present.
However, the Reuters agency met on Sunday in Bezimenne, a village located approximately thirty kilometers east of Mariupol, in the territory of the self-proclaimed pro-Russian republic of Donetsk.
One of them, Natalia Ousmanova, narrated the horrible lives in the bunkers of the metallurgical complex, and the fear caused by the bombings of the Russian army.
When the bunker started to shake I was hysterical, my husband would attest to that. I was afraid the bunker might collapsesaid the 37-year-old woman.
You can’t imagine what we went through: terror. All my life I lived and worked there. What we saw was just terrible.
According to Ukrainian authorities, about 100,000 civilians still remain in Mariupol, including hundreds detained in Azovstal.
Source: Radio-Canada
