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Mothers trapped in tunnels deep below the Mariupol Azovstal steel plant have pleaded for an evacuation route for them and their children in a video released by the Ukrainian armed forces on Saturday.
“Our food reserves that we brought here with us are running out. We are on the brink of starvation, we will not be able to feed even our children,” said a mother who has been in the tunnels since February 25.
“We are asking for safety guarantees for our children,” she added.
A woman holds a child in a makeshift bomb shelter in Mariupol, Ukraine, Monday, March 7, 2022 (AP Photo / Mstyslav Chernov)
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Footage taken earlier in the week showed Ukrainian soldiers transporting supplies to a group of mostly women and children bunkered at the Azovstal steel plant.
The soldiers greeted the crowd of children, who, despite their excited faces, when they saw the newcomers, asked when they could reunite with family members and said, “We want to go home, we want to see the sun.”
The Azovstal steel plant has become a symbol of resistance against Russian forces that have been pushing the city for more than eight weeks.
Some people who worked in the factory brought their families to the tunnels, while others fled the scene to hide from rocket and rocket fire.
“We just ran here after our building was shelled. We relied on a corridor for help, but we got stuck here, in the bomb shelter of the Azov plant. And we are still waiting, “the woman said, noting that she and her family had been under a plant since March 5.
“On February 27, my grandmother, mother and I left home,” a girl told the soldiers, adding that they had been separated from her brothers. “After that, we saw neither the sky nor the sun. “
Ukrainian authorities estimate that about 1,000 civilians and soldiers have taken refuge in the tunnels.
Russia has reportedly stepped up its bombing campaign at the plant in an attempt to put pressure on Ukrainian troops to surrender.
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Ukrainian authorities have repeatedly called for the recognition of humanitarian corridors to allow for the safe evacuation of women, children and the elderly who have been trapped in tunnels for months.
“No day is quiet enough here, there is always shooting,” said one woman, noting that they were afraid to go out even to use the bathroom.
Despite the difficult circumstance, even Ukrainian soldiers looked with smiles on their faces as they delivered supplies and talked to children and asked about games they played to keep them busy.
But when they talked to the women in the room, the mothers asked them to take them to safety.
“Please get us out of here. We want to see a peaceful sky, “said one woman. – We want to breathe fresh air.
For weeks, Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk has been trying to facilitate evacuation corridors from Mariupol with an agreement allegedly reached on Saturday.
But Vereshchuk warned Ukrainians to be “careful” and said Russian troops were following “parallel” evacuation routes to Russia, not to regions west of Donetsk.
It remains unclear whether evacuation efforts were successful on Saturday or whether any of the civilians in the tunnels managed to reach these corridors.
An armed serviceman from the militia of the Donetsk People’s Republic passes a building damaged during the fighting in Mariupol on Wednesday. (AP / Alexey Alexandrov)
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“We would like to have a regime of silence [ceasefire]”said a man of the Ukrainian troops.” I have been here for 56 days and nights. There is a lack of food and water.
“I just want to go out and see my relatives and friends,” he continued. “Make us a corridor of help so that we can safely and peacefully transfer women, children and the elderly, because we will not last long like this.
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