All women, children and elderly civilians have been evacuated from the bombed-out Azovstal steel mill in Mariupol, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister has said.
The Soviet-era steel mill, the last holdout in Mariupol for Ukrainian forces, has emerged as a symbol of resistance to the wider Russian effort to capture swathes of eastern and southern Ukraine.
Under heavy bombardment, fighters and civilians have been trapped for weeks in deep bunkers and tunnels that criss-cross the site.
Russian forces backed by tanks and artillery tried again on Saturday to storm Azovstal, part of a ferocious assault to dislodge the last Ukrainian defenders in the strategic port city on the Azov Sea.
Mariupol has been left in ruins by weeks of Russian bombardment. Several groups of civilians have left the sprawling steel complex during pauses in fighting over the past week.
Evacuations of civilians from the plant began last weekend. But they were halted during the week by renewed fighting.
The city’s mayor estimated earlier this week that 200 civilians were trapped at the plant.
It was not clear after the deputy prime minister’s statement on Saturday if civilian men were still in the complex.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a late-night video address on Friday that Ukraine was also working on a diplomatic effort to save fighters barricaded inside the steel works.
It was unclear how many fighters remained there. They have vowed not to surrender.
Ukrainian officials fear Russian forces want to wipe them out by Monday, in time for Moscow’s commemorations of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two.
President Vladimir Putin declared victory in Mariupol on April 21, ordered the plant sealed off and called for Ukrainian forces inside to disarm. But Russia later resumed its assault on the plant.
Asked about plans for Russia to mark Monday’s anniversary in parts of Ukraine it holds, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday: ‘The time will come to mark Victory Day in Mariupol.’
The Kremlin calls its actions since February 24 a ‘special military operation’ to disarm Ukraine and rid it of what it calls anti-Russian nationalism fomented by the West.
Ukraine and the West say Russia launched an unprovoked war.
Mariupol, which lies between the Crimea Peninsula seized by Moscow in 2014 and parts of eastern Ukraine taken by Russia-backed separatists that year, is key to linking up the two Russian-held territories and blocking Ukrainian exports.
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