Ukrainian forces have completed their “combat mission” in the besieged city of Mariupol, according to a statement from the country’s military.
According to foreign media, the Telegraph reports, the commanders of the units located in the massive steel plant in the city of Azovstal have been ordered to “save the lives of their personnel”, also stated in the statement of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, writes CNN .
Hundreds of people were evacuated Monday from the steel plant, the last “shelter” in a city that had become a symbol of Ukrainian resistance to relentless Russian bombing.
Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar described the evacuation operation in a separate statement, noting that some Ukrainian forces remain in Azovstal.
“Fifty-three seriously injured people were evacuated from Azovstal to a medical facility in Novoazovsk for medical care,” she said. “Another 211 people were sent to Olenivka through the humanitarian corridor.”
An “exchange procedure” will see the evacuees return home, Malyar said.
“Ukraine needs living Ukrainian heroes,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a statement on the evacuation on Monday, thanking the Ukrainian military and negotiators, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the United Nations.
“The 82nd day of our defense is coming to an end. A hard day. “But this day, like all others, aims precisely at saving our country and our people,” said Zelensky.
Russia’s Defense Ministry had earlier said a ceasefire had been established to allow the passage of wounded Ukrainian servicemen, according to the state-run RIA Novosti news agency.
Mariupol, a port city on the Sea of Azov, has been the scene of some of the most intense fighting in Ukraine since Russia began its occupation in late February.
Many civilians have already been evacuated. But Ukrainian fighters in the city, in April, had vowed to “fight to the end”, despite being surrounded, with little ammunition and in large numbers by Russian forces.
The country’s Azov regiment also issued a statement Monday saying “the entire Mariupol garrison” was carrying out life-saving orders.
