With the evacuation of Ukrainian troops from Mariupol, Russia seems to have taken control of the once prosperous city after months of bombing. On Monday, the evacuation of the soldiers who had been holed up in the last Ukrainian stronghold in the besieged port city started: the Azovstal steel factory.
In five buses, 53 wounded soldiers from the Azovstal steel plant were transported to a hospital in the Russian-controlled city of Novoazovsk, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) east of Mariupol.
Their evacuation got underway after Russia promised several hours earlier that it would evacuate wounded Ukrainian soldiers to a medical facility in Novoazovsk. The buses arrived there late Monday night. Some of the injured were carried from the buses on stretchers.
Possible exchange of Ukrainian and Russian soldiers
A group of 211 soldiers were taken to the city of Olenivka, in an area controlled by the Russian-backed separatists, Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Anna Malyar said. All evacuees will be involved in a possible prisoner exchange with Russia, she added.
In the steel factory, about six hundred Ukrainian men are said to have held out until the last moment. “We hope we can save the lives of our boys,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said late Monday night. “There are serious injuries among them. They are being cared for now. Ukraine needs its heroes alive.”
“President Zelensky: ‘Ukraine needs its heroes alive’”
The Ukrainian army said it had “ordered the commanders of the units stationed in Azovstal to save the lives of the personnel” and that the troops there had completed their combat mission. Work is underway to rescue the troops still in Azovstal, the army added. It is not stated how many troops are involved.
Important defeat for Ukraine
The evacuation is a major defeat for Ukraine and likely marks the end of the longest and bloodiest battle of the war in Ukraine to date. Mariupol has been destroyed after a Russian siege that killed tens of thousands of people in the city, Ukraine said.
Azovstal’s last defenders held out for weeks in bunkers and tunnels built deep underground to withstand nuclear war. Earlier this month, civilians were evacuated from the complex, one of the largest steel plants in Europe.
Ukrainian troops say they resisted for a total of 82 days in Azovstal. They thus gained time for the Ukrainian army to engage in battle with Russian forces and obtain the western weapons needed to do so.
The wife of a member of the Azov Regiment described the conditions at the factory on Monday: “They are in hell. They sustain new injuries every day. They are missing legs or arms, are exhausted, have no medicine,” said Natalia Zaritskaya.