Kiev. Thousands of civilians fled yesterday, March 8, from areas besieged by Russian forces.
Two convoys of dozens of trucks left Sumy, about 350 km northeast of Kiev, in a new attempt to create humanitarian corridors after the bombings the day before, which left at least 21 dead in that city of 250,000 inhabitants, reported the regional prosecutor’s office.
Hours later, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense accused Russia of not respecting the humanitarian corridor in Mariupol, a strategic port city in the south, from where some 300,000 people were to leave.
“The enemy launched an attack exactly in the direction of the humanitarian corridor,” the ministry denounced.
Russia had announced a ceasefire to let civilians from big cities leave.
But a good part of the evacuation routes proposed by Moscow go through Russia and Belarus (Russia’s ally), something unacceptable for Kiev.
The Russian army announced a new humanitarian truce for today starting at 7 in the morning.
The United Nations balance puts the number of civilians killed by the invasion at 406, a figure surely much lower than the real one.
The Pentagon has estimated that between “2,000 and 4,000 Russian soldiers” have been killed since the start of the offensive, a rough estimate that should be taken with caution as it was drawn from multiple sources, according to US intelligence officials.
In Mikolaiv, near Odesa (south), the cars formed lines of several kilometers to flee from the fighting that was approaching.
In front of the central hospital, Sabrina, 18, was waiting for her mother, carrying a cat, a dog and several bags. “We’re going to leave as quickly as possible. Every day there is shelling, it’s terrifying,” she said.
“Angry”
US intelligence chiefs yesterday called Russian President Vladimir Putin an “angry” and isolated leader fighting for global influence, frustrated that his invasion of Ukraine has not gone as planned, and making provocative nuclear threats to the West. .
The director of National Intelligence, Avril Haines, considered that “Putin’s nuclear saber rattling” has put the West on notice. The invasion has produced “a shock to the geopolitical order with implications for the future that we are just beginning to understand, but which we are sure will have consequences,” she said.