Russia opened corridors on Tuesday to allow people to leave five Ukrainian cities: Cherhihiv, Kharkiv, Mariupol and the capital Kyiv, as well as Sumy.
“From 10:00 MSK (0700 GMT) on March 8, 2022, the Russian Federation is declaring a ‘regime of silence’ and is ready to provide humanitarian corridors,” said a cell of the Russian Defense Ministry charged with humanitarian operations in Ukraine.
It said the Ukrainian authorities had so far been “unable to ensure the functioning of humanitarian corridors,” noting that the situation in many Ukrainian cities “has deteriorated rapidly and has acquired the character of a humanitarian disaster.”
The Russian Emergencies Ministry has delivered about 430 tonnes of humanitarian aid to the territory of Ukraine, the ministry’s press service told TASS on Tuesday.
Ukraine started evacuating residents from the northeastern city of Sumy on Tuesday, Ukraine’s UNIAN news agency reported.
“The first column started moving out of the city at 10:00 (0800 GMT),” the agency said.
Dmytro Lunin, acting head of the military-civilian administration of Poltava, a city in northeast Ukraine, said that 35 buses were sent to Sumy for the evacuation.
“The convoy includes representatives of the Red Cross and doctors. We also sent 20 tonnes of humanitarian aid: food and medicine,” he said, noting that the Ukrainian side would observe a ceasefire to ensure the safety of civilians during the evacuation.
The relaunch of the humanitarian corridors came after Russian and Ukrainian negotiators failed to achieve significant results during their third round of peace talks in Belarus on Monday.
The Russian and Ukrainian foreign ministers are expected to meet in Turkey on Thursday.
Refugees now at 2 million
More than 2 million people have fled Ukraine since the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine conflict less than two weeks ago, according to the United Nations.
“Today the outflow of refugees from Ukraine reaches 2 million people,” United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said in a tweet on Tuesday. Poland alone has received nearly half of all those fleeing Ukraine, with Tuesday’s figures showing that 1.2 million had crossed into the country in the past 13 days.
Hungary meanwhile has taken in nearly 191,350 people, Slovakia 140,745 and Russia itself has seen 99,300 people cross over from Ukraine, the data showed.
Moldova and Romania had each received over 82,000 refugees each, according to data gathered on Sunday, while over 210,000 people who fled into neighboring countries have already moved on to other European nations, UN refugee chief found.
On Sunday, Grandi said the conflict in Ukraine was fueling Europe’s fastest growing refugee crisis since World War II.
