Ukraine makes new attempt to evacuate civilians from Mariupol
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Buses on the way to Mariupol, Ukraine, to pick up evacuees, on March 8, 2022.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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LVIV (REUTERS) - Ukraine hoped to start evacuating civilians through a "humanitarian corridor" from Mariupol on Thursday (March 10), a day after it said a children's hospital was hit in a Russian air strike on the southern port city.
Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said Mariupol was one of seven cities from which the government hoped to evacuate residents trapped by fighting since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb 24.
Several previous attempts to establish a humanitarian corridor from Mariupol have failed, and people in the city of more than 400,000 people have been sheltering there without water or power for over a week.
Each side has blamed the other for the collapse of local ceasefires, including around Mariupol, where the children's hospital was hit.
Local officials said at least three people were killed, including a young girl.
"Three people were killed, including a female child, in yesterday's attack on a children's and maternity hospital in Ukraine's besieged Mariupol, according to updated figures this morning," the city council said on its Telegram channel on Thursday.
Officials had previously said 17 people were injured in the attack.
Russia said reports that it had bombarded the hospital were "fake news" and amounted to "information terrorism". It said the premises were no longer used as a hospital and had long ago been taken over by Ukrainian troops.
"This is information terrorism," Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.
The Kremlin said it would approach the Russian military for details of the strike, which Ukraine leader Volodymyr Zelensky called a "war crime".
"We will certainly ask our military about this, since we don't have clear information about what happened there. Without fail, the military will provide some kind of information," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
Ukraine has managed to start evacuating people from some areas this week, including the north-eastern city of Sumy, where a humanitarian corridor opened for the third successive day on Thursday under a local ceasefire.
"The (evacuation) columns are leaving. The ceasefire has been agreed!" said Mr Dmytro Zhyvytsky, the governor of the Sumy region.
People were also leaving the nearby settlements of Krasnopillya and Trostyanets, he said.
