Deputy PM: Civilians could not be evacuated from Mariupol on 21 April
Alyona Mazurenko – Thursday, 21 April 2022, 22:23
Iryna Vereshchuk, Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine, said that shelling by the Russian occupiers prevented the evacuation of civilians from Mariupol.
Source: Iryna Vereshchuk, on Telegram
According to Vereshchuk: "No good news from Mariupol. It’s very tough. Everything that the Russians are doing is difficult, chaotic, slow, and, of course, deceitful.
The only encouraging fact is that yesterday people were able to leave Mariupol for the first time, straight to Zaporizhzhia (I mean the four buses that left Mariupol yesterday).
We ask for forgiveness from those Mariupol residents who have not been evacuated today. There was a shelling near the assembly point, which forced us to close the corridor."
Details: Vereshchuk added that the Ukrainian side will continue trying to evacuate Mariupol residents from the city besieged by the Russian occupiers.
Earlier: Evacuation buses with 79 Mariupol residents who left the besieged city on 20 April arrived on territory controlled by the Ukrainian government.
Background:
- On 20 April 4 evacuation buses managed to leave Mariupol along the "green corridor" to Berdiansk. They spent the night there and were planning to move towards Zaporizhzhia via Vasylivka on 21 April.
- Ukraine is demanding that Russia open a safe corridor for the evacuation of civilians and wounded soldiers from the underground shelters on the Azovstal plant, which is still controlled by Ukrainian troops. Davyd Arakhamia and Mykhailo Podoliak, members of the Ukrainian negotiation delegation, offered to hold an urgent round of talks in Mariupol in order to ensure the safe evacuation of civilians.
- As of the afternoon of 21 April, Russian occupiers continued to bomb and shell the territory of the Azovstal plant in Mariupol, where both Ukrainian soldiers and civilians are sheltering.
- President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine believes that the siege of Mariupol can be broken militarily, but this requires obtaining more weapons from Western partners.
- Satellite images show a 300-metre long mass grave where Russian occupiers buried Mariupol civilians who had been killed.
